The image on the
front cover is adapted from an illustration in a northern Italian
compendium of canon law (c. 825). It depicts emperor Constantine and
the Catholic bishops at the Council of Nicaea (325AD) overseeing the
destruction of books that had been declared heretical.

Introduction

Jesus and the apostles gave many
warnings of false teaching and corruption in the church1.
Jesus even hinted at the possibility that authentic Christianity
might cease to exist.

Nevertheless, when the Son of
Man comes, will he find faith on earth?

Luke 18:8

Jesus also gave us instructions on how to identify
such false teachers:

For no good tree
bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit, for each
tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from
thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. The good
person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the
evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the
abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.

Luke 6:34-45

In this booklet I will briefly review the history
of Christianity and the bible. I will examine how beliefs and the
bible have developed and changed at various points in history. I
will also look at, and discuss the teachings and actions of some of
the key individuals involved in these changes, applying the simple
test outlined by Jesus of identifying the tree by its fruit. We
shall see that many of the people responsible for giving us the bible
are the very thorn bushes Jesus warned us of in the verses above, and
so the mainstream Christian bible should not be trusted. As well as
outlining this argument, I will discuss the counter arguments to this
line of reasoning that some apologists and evangelists put forward.

I will argue that, as modern Christians, we have a
duty to carefully investigate the changes that have occurred in
Christian beliefs and scriptures and restore the original teachings
of Christianity. I do not believe that the answer is as simple as
reverting to the beliefs and writings of one of the older branches of
Christianity; rather I believe we should be realistic and open minded
to the idea that all branches of Christianity made mistakes during
their development, and that several may have carried forward some
elements of the truth.

A secondary goal of this article is to provide a
review of Christian history for anyone who has little background
knowledge of this subject.

This article is
divided into the following sections:-

In the first section I will give a brief
outline of what the main branches of modern Christianity are, and
how and when they came into existence. This background information
may be useful for anyone who knows relatively little about the
history of Christianity.

After that I will explain the evidence that
supports my argument properly in sections which examine several key
eras of Christian history, examining the attitudes to scripture of
people at these times. The first period of history is the early
church, prior to the time of Marcion (c. 140AD).

Section three discusses the so called
'Catholic' branch of Christianity during and after time of Marcion,
but before Christianity became the dominant religion of the Roman
empire (c. 140-312AD).

Section four discusses the period of the
Christian Roman emperors who favoured Christianity and promoted it
throughout the empire (312-480AD).

Section five briefly discusses developments
during the middle ages.

Section six discusses the violence of the
Protestant reformation and also looks at the period after it (1517
onwards).

Section seven examines and refutes counter
arguments that may be put forward in response to the arguments in
this article.

Section eight examines the key underlying
cause of violence that has plagued both Catholic and Protestant
Christianity, and how this is connected to the foundational
Christian beliefs and scriptures. This section also summarises my
conclusions.

Section 1 – The Branches of Christianity

There are numerous groups in the modern world
which identify as Christian. The three largest are the Catholics,
the Protestants and the Orthodox. The Protestant branch itself is
not a unified whole, but is subdivided into numerous denominations:
Anglican, Baptists, Calvinists, Lutheran, Methodists, etc., many of
whom have significant points of disagreement.

The oldest of these three groups is the
Catholics, dating to the second century2.
In the fourth century the Catholics became very powerful and
influential in the Roman empire; they used that power to spread their
beliefs throughout all of Europe, persecuting and killing
non-Catholics (this will be discussed in detail in section 4). It
was these Catholics who decided which documents should be considered
scripture and included in the bible. Initially this was a subject of
heated debate, but a consensus gradually emerged during the fourth
and early fifth centuries.

During the eleventh century the East-West Schism,
(also known as the Great Schism) divided Christianity in Europe. The
Greek speaking eastern church came to be known as the Orthodox
Church, while the Latin speaking western Church continued to be know
as the Catholic Church. Both groups continued to read from the same
collection of 27 New Testament books.

In the 15th century Constantinople (the capital
city of the Greek speaking portion of the Christian world) was
defeated and captured by the Ottoman Turks. Numerous Greek speaking
refugees fled into Western Europe, bringing with them knowledge of
the ancient Greek language and numerous Greek copies of the bible;
Greek is the original language of almost all of the New Testament and
up until that time almost all western Christians had been reading
from Latin translations. In the Catholic areas of Europe a renewed
interest in the Greek bible developed, and many Christians begun to
realise that the teachings of their church were not compatible with
the bible; there was a great deal of discontent because members of
the church hierarchy were using Christianity to amass wealth whist
ignoring its moral teachings. This discontent lead to the Protestant
reformation. This was another period of horrific violence between
Christians (discussed in section 6).

The Protestant Reformation led to the creation of
several new branches of Christianity most of which aimed to hold
beliefs based purely on the bible. Of course the bible can be
interpreted in different ways, and so despite this common underlying
goal Protestantism itself has always been very fragmented. In
contrast, the Catholic and Orthodox churches base their beliefs on
church tradition as well as the bible, and so besides the Great
Schism itself, neither of these has fragmented in the way the
Protestant movement has. When the Protestants broke away from the
Catholics they made changes to the bible by rejecting a number of
books from the Old Testament; these books are known as the
inter-testament literature, or the apocrypha. Some key Protestant
figures argued for changes to the New Testament as well (Luther
wanted to remove the Epistle of
James, because he felt it contradicted the teaching of
salvation by faith alone and not works) in the end however, no
changes where made to the list of books included in the New
Testament.

The bibles of Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox
Christians have more in common than they have differences and all
include the same 27 books in the New Testament; however it would be
incorrect to say that their bibles are identical. There are
differences in which books are included in the Old Testament. There
are also differences of opinion about which manuscripts are most
reliable, resulting in differences to the text throughout the bible.
In particular, the manuscripts used by the Orthodox Church for the
Old Testament are significantly different to those used by Catholics
and Protestants; the Orthodox version of Daniel (for example) is
significantly longer than the Catholic and Protestant versions.
There are also differences in how each of these groups interpret many
passages.

There were once many more branches of
Christianity than the ones I have mentioned above, such as the
Marcionites, Gnostics, Ebionites and Manicheans. They had scriptures
that were radically different from the bibles of the Protestants,
Catholics and Orthodox and there is evidence that some of these
ancient Christian groups are older than Catholicism3.
Those ancient groups were destroyed when the Catholics gained
political power in the fourth century, a period that we shall examine
in detail shortly. In this article I will say only a little about
these lost rival groups and their scriptures; I will focus instead on
the spiritual forefathers of modern Christianity.

Section 2 – Christianity before Marcion: c.30AD to c.140AD

When Christian evangelists, apologists
and preachers write about the history of the bible they often start
by looking at what the apostles themselves said about their own and
each others writing, citing verses like 2 Timothy 3:16 and 2
Peter 3:14-16. Such a tactic contains the implicit assumption
that the bible itself is already known to be reliable, a somewhat
circular argument4.
Instead of this approach, when I study the history of Christianity
my main sources are the writings of people known as the Catholic
fathers (or simply “church fathers”, some of the oldest are
sometimes called “apostolic fathers” because they were supposedly
taught by the apostles themselves). These people were all
influential early Christians whose writings have been preserved by
the church. From their writings we can map out a history of the
development of the bible that is not dependant upon the bible itself.
We will see when the various books first came to be regarded as
scripture and who was involved in making those decisions.

2A –
Clement of Rome

The Catholic Church (and it's
offshoots) claim that there was a succession of Christian teachers
all with reasonably similar beliefs stretching right back to the
apostles themselves, thus a connection is said to exist between the
modern church and the apostles. If this claim were true, we should
have some written record of their lives, some of their writings
should have been preserved by the church, and there should be some
evidence that they did indeed have beliefs and scriptures similar to
those of the later church. In reality the oldest Catholic father
whose writings survive is (supposedly) Clement of Rome (traditionally
said to have been the fourth pope). The vast majority of writings
that bear his name are universally regarded as fraudulent. There is
one epistle that might have been written by him (known as 1
Clement) but even this is dogged by unanswered questions
challenging its authenticity and integrity5.
1 Clement, typically dated c. 94-96AD, though if it is
fraudulent it probably dates to the early mid second century.

In spite of the issues and
uncertainties associated with 1 Clement, let us see what it
can tell us about its author's views about scripture. The contents
of the epistle indicate that the author's views about what should be
considered scripture were substantially different to the views of the
later church; the author frequently quotes the Jewish bible (also
known as the “Old Testament”, though that term did not exist in
Clement's time), the epistles of Paul, and the statements of Jesus.
The epistles of Paul and words of Jesus are clearly very
influential6,
but only the Jewish bible is referred to as scripture7.

Interestingly, when he quotes Jesus, the
statements consistently do not match the wording of any known gospel.
The author gives no indication that he was working from a written
source, and asks his readers to “remember”
the words of Jesus (chapter 46); it is likely that he was quoting
directly from oral tradition rather than written gospels.

2B –
The Didache

The Didache (full English title: The
Teaching of the Twelve Apostles) is another early Christian
document; the identity of the author is not known, but it can still
give us insights into the views of some early Christians regarding
scripture.

Its author quotes from a gospel, and the wording
of the quotes agrees reasonably well with the modern Gospel of
Matthew. There is no indication of whether or not the author
considered that book to be scripture. Also, the gospel that is
quoted is referred to simply as “the gospel” (Didache 8:2
and 15:3-4) instead of “Matthew”
implying that the writer had little regard for Mark, Luke
and John; he may not have even been aware of the existence of
those other gospels.

2C –
The epistles of Ignatius and Polycarp

Ignatius and Polycarp are commonly said
to have lived and written during the early second century. As with
the epistles of Clement, there are numerous issues questions
concerning the authenticity and integrity of these epistles.

In total there are fifteen epistles
that have traditional been attributed to Ignatius and one for
Polycarp; though, there is universal agreement among scholars that
eight of the epistles of Ignatius are fraudulent. Furthermore, the
remaining seven epistles of Ignatius exist in multiple versions: the
Long Recension, the Middle Recension, and the so called “Syriac
Abridgement” (three epistles only); confusingly the Middle
Recension and the Syriac Abridgement are both sometimes referred to
as the “Short Recension” a name that I shall avoid using.

There is unanimous agreement among
scholars and historians that the epistles of the Long Recension were
created by forgers interpolating and expanding the Middle Recension.
A small number of scholars have argued that the “Syriac
Abridgement” version is closest of the three to the original
writings of Ignatius; however, the majority regard the Middle
Recension as the most authentic existing version.

The text of Polycarp's epistle also
contains several anomalies. Some have argued that it may be a
composite of multiple letters edited together, whilst others argue
that it has been greatly interpolated.

Some scholars and historians argue that
none of the epistles were truly written by Ignatius or Polycarp8.
Even if these epistles are fraudulent, or have suffered alteration,
it is clear from their content that they come from a time when the
first Catholics were only just establishing their beliefs and
movement9,
and so they are incredibly valuable sources of information in spite
of the numerous issues surrounding them. I personally have no
opinion about whether the Syriac Abridgement or the Middle Recension
is the more authentic version; nor will I concern myself with the
possibility that all of the epistles of Ignatius and Polycarp might
be fraudulent. I will proceed by examining the epistles of the
Middle Recension on the basis that even if they are fraudulent or
corrupt they none-the-less must date to the second century, and can
thus shed light on the attitudes of second century Catholics,
regardless of other considerations.

According to the Catholic fathers who
came after them10,
Polycarp and Ignatius are were close friends and both were taught by
the apostle John. Polycarp was bishop of Smyrna and Ignatius was
bishop of Antioch. The letters are set in the rather tenuous
scenario in which Ignatius is being taken by Roman guards to the
arena in Rome, where he is to be killed11.
During the journey, the guards permit him to be visited by
Christians from the cities along the way. Ignatius supposedly used
these visits to learn about the situation that local churches are in,
and wrote letters which addressed those situations.

The letters indicate that everywhere Ignatius
looks he is confronted by vast numbers of Christians who's beliefs
are so different to his own that he hates them and considers their
faith to be an abomination12;
such people are described as “beasts
in the shape of men” (Ignatius' Epistle to
the Smyrnaeans, chapter 4) and “ravenous
dogs” (Ignatius' Epistle to the Ephesians,
chapter 7). The author of the epistles of Ignatius is possibly the
first person known to use the identity “Catholic”
(Smyrnaeans 8); thus the hatred of doctrinal diversity which
would be come of typical of Catholicism can be seen here, among its
earliest roots.

The epistles of Ignatius reveal another,
disturbing aspect of early Christianity; many early Christians
venerated martyrdom to such an extent than they actively and
deliberately sought to die as martyrs. Many of them believed that
having faith in Jesus meant deliberately seeking out death at the
hands of the Romans. The Epistle to the Romans, indicates
that some of the Christians in Rome are influential and might use
their influence to save Ignatius' life, but he is eager to die, and
begs them not to do this:

I write to the Churches, and
impress on them all, that I shall willingly die for God, unless ye
hinder me. I beseech of you not to show an unseasonable good-will
towards me. Suffer me to become food for the wild beasts, through
whose instrumentality it will be granted me to attain to God. I am
the wheat of God, and let me be ground by the teeth of the wild
beasts, that I may be found the pure bread of Christ. Rather entice
the wild beasts, that they may become my tomb, and may leave
nothing of my body; so that when I have fallen asleep [in death], I
may be no trouble to any one. Then shall I truly be a disciple of
Christ, when the world shall not see so much as my body. Entreat
Christ for me, that by these instruments I may be found a sacrifice
[to God].

Ignatius' Epistle to the Romans, chapter 4

Similar sentiments are expressed in the other
letters:

For, on hearing that I came
bound from Syria for the common name and hope, trusting through your
prayers to be permitted to fight with beasts at Rome, that so by
martyrdom I may indeed become the disciple of Him “who gave Himself
for us, an offering and sacrifice to God,” ye hastened to see me.

Ignatius, Epistle to the Ephesians, chapter
1

For I do indeed desire to
suffer, but I know not if I be worthy to do so.

Ignatius, Trallians 4

For though I am alive while I
write to you, yet I am eager to die.

Ignatius, Romans 7

Then we find this ironic statement:

Flee, therefore, those evil
offshoots [of Satan], which produce death-bearing fruit, whereof if
any one tastes, he instantly dies.

Ignatius in Trallians 11

Like 1 Clement and the Didache, the
short version of the seven epistles of Ignatius also do not contain
any indication that the author conceived of such a thing as Christian
scripture. Obviously he considered the Jewish bible to be scripture,
and quoted from it frequently. He also quoted from the gospels, and
the epistles of Paul, but there is no indication that he considered
them to be inspired; he does not introduce them with a formula of
authority (i.e. “as it is written” or “the scripture says”),
as he often does when quoting from the Jewish bible13.
Also, we cannot take the quotations of New Testament books as an
indication that there was any agreement at that time about which ones
were authentic, since in Ignatius' Epistle to the Smyrnæans,
chapter 3, there is a quotation from the Gospel of the Nazarenes14.

Polycarp meanwhile (if his epistle is genuine) is
possibly the first person to refer to any New Testament book as
scripture; in chapter 12 of his epistle he applies this term to
Paul's Ephesians.

2D –
Papias

Papias
was the bishop of Hierapolis; he wrote a number of works, probably in
the early second century. Few details of his life are known, and his
writings have not survived; though, a few small fragments of them
were quoted in other documents that have survived. According to
Irenaeus, Papias was taught by the apostle John15;
though Papias' own
statements contradict this:

But I shall not be
unwilling to put down, along with my interpretations, whatsoever
instructions I received with care at any time from the elders, and
stored up with care in my memory, assuring you at the same time of
their truth. For I did not, like the multitude, take pleasure in
those who spoke much, but in those who taught the truth; nor in those
who related strange commandments, but in those who rehearsed the
commandments given by the Lord to faith, and proceeding from truth
itself. If, then, any one who had attended on the elders came, I
asked minutely after their sayings,—what Andrew or Peter said, or
what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by
Matthew, or by any other of the Lord’s disciples: which things
Aristion and the presbyter John, the disciples of the Lord, say. For
I imagined that what was to be got from books was not so profitable
to me as what came from the living and abiding voice.

Papias makes it clear that there are two Johns;
one is the apostle who travelled with Jesus, whom he refers to in the
past tense and has never met; the other is John the “presbyter”
(or “elder”
- “πρεσβύτερος”
) who is in a different category and is listed (by implication
ranked) after “Aristion”
(whoever that is). If you wish to find out more about the authorship
of some of the epistles of John I suggest you now consult 2 John
1:1 and 3 John 1:1 where the author identifies himself
clearly.

Papias is the first person (who's writings survive
– well, sort of) to mention the names of any of the gospels; he
also says a little about their authorship:

And the presbyter said this.
Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote

down accurately whatsoever he
remembered. It was not, however, in exact order that he related the
sayings or deeds of Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor
accompanied Him. But afterwards, as I said, he accompanied Peter, who
accommodated his instructions to the necessities [of his hearers],
but with no intention of giving a regular narrative of the Lord’s
sayings. Wherefore Mark made no mistake in thus writing some things
as he remembered them. For of one thing he took especial care, not to
omit anything he had heard, and not to put anything fictitious into
the statements.

Matthew put together the oracles
[of the Lord] in the Hebrew language, and each one interpreted them
as best he could.

Whilst written gospels existed at this time,
Papias' comments in the first quotation imply that oral tradition was
held in higher regard. We have no reason to believe that Papias
considered the gospels, or any other writings of the apostles, to be
scripture.

Papias' statements about Matthew appear to
be describing a sayings gospel (a list of quotes and commentary like
the Gospel of Thomas or the hypothesised Quelle) rather than a
narrative account of Jesus' life, as we have in the modern Matthew.
There is also evidence that our Matthew was written in Greek
and that it was written by adding additional material (mostly sayings
of Jesus) to the Gospel of Mark. The simplest explanation for
these discrepancies is that the document which Papias knew as
“Matthew”
was a sayings list, and that someone later combined that with Mark
to create the gospel that we call “Matthew”; presumably
this happened sometime in the second century. Alternatively, if the
statements of Papias do not contain reliable information about the
origins of Matthew and Mark then we know nothing about
the authorship of those gospels.

Further evidence that Papias was not familiar with
the document we call Matthew is found in fragment 3 in
Anti-Nicene Fathers, volume 1. Here Papias relates an
account of the death of Judas Iscariot which bears little resemblance
to the accounts found in the bible (Matthew 27:3-8 and Acts
1:18-19):

Judas walked about in this world
a sad example of impiety; for his body having swollen to such an
extent that he could not pass where a chariot could pass easily, he
was crushed by the chariot, so that his bowels gushed out.

It is remarkable that that the few small surviving
fragments of Papias' writing which survive cause such challenges for
the traditional account of the history of the bible. In later
centuries some (such as Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea in the 4th
century) came to have a very low opinion of the writings of Papias
(Eusebius describes him as “a
man of exceedingly small intelligence” –
Historia Ecclesiastica 3:39:13). I suspect that this is why
Papias' works were not ultimately preserved by the church; a great
lost to our knowledge of history.

2E –
The Epistle of Barnabas

Besides Polycarp's epistle, the only Christian
document of this period that refers to a New Testament book as
scripture is the Epistle of Barnabas. In chapter 4 of that
epistle there is a quotation of Matthew 22:14 preceded by the
authoritative formula “it
is written”. Many early Christians believed
that the Epistle of Barnabas was the work St Barnabas
(mentioned in Galatians 2:1 and frequently mentioned in Acts)
and in the 3rd century some considered it scripture; this
is no longer widely believed. There is considerable uncertainty
about the date of this epistle, estimates range from 70AD to 130AD.

Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the Epistle
of Barnabas is the very obvious sympathy that its author has for
certain elements of Gnostic teaching. The Gnostics where one of the
rival Christian groups that the Catholics considered heretics. Their
teaching focused on the idea that believers must acquire hidden
spiritual knowledge:

I have hastened briefly
to write unto you, in order that, along with your faith, ye might
have perfect
knowledge.

(from chapter 1)

What, then, says Knowledge?
Learn: “Trust,” she says, “in Him who is to be manifested to
you in the flesh—that is, Jesus.” For man is earth in a suffering
state, for the formation of Adam was from the face of the earth.
What, then, meaneth this: “into the good land, a land flowing with
milk and honey?” Blessed be our Lord, who has placed in us
wisdom and understanding of secret things.

(from chapter 6)

No one has been admitted by
me to a more excellent piece of knowledge than this, but I know that
ye are worthy.

(from chapter 9)

Another interesting aspect of the Epistle of
Barnabas is the author's belief that the Jews lost their covenant
with God almost immediately after it was made.

And this also I further beg of
you… not to be like some, adding largely to your sins, and saying,
“The covenant is both theirs and ours.” But they thus finally
lost it, after Moses had already received it. For the Scripture
saith, “And Moses was fasting in the mount forty days and forty
nights, and received the covenant from the Lord, tables of stone
written with the finger of the hand of the Lord;”[Exodus
31:18, 34:28] but turning away to idols, they
lost it. For the Lord speaks thus to Moses: “Moses go down quickly;
for the people whom thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt have
transgressed.”[Exodus
32:7, Deuteronomy
9:12] And Moses understood [the meaning of God],
and cast the two tables out of his hands; and their covenant was
broken, in order that the covenant of the beloved Jesus might be
sealed upon our heart, in the hope which flows from believing in Him.

Epistle of Barnabas, chapter 4

This is an idea known as replacement theology.
Replacement theology comes in many forms and variations, but
basically it is rooted in the following line of reasoning:

(1) Christian God is the same being as the God
of the Jews and Jesus is the Jewish messiah.

Therefore: (2) The the Jewish scriptures are
also Christian scripture (the “Old
Testament”, though this term came later –
see Section 3C on Tertullian).

But: (3) The Jews reject Jesus; they say he does
not fulfil the Messianic prophesies and that Christian teachings
are incompatible with their scripture.

Therefore: (4) The Jews must be evil and deluded
and must no longer be the chosen people of God described in the
“Old
Testament”.

Therefore: (5) The Covenant between God and the
Jews much have been abolished; the Jews have been rejected by God
and the Christian church has replaced the Jews as God's chosen
people. All of the promises given to Abraham and other Jewish
fathers are now applicable to the Christian church instead of the
Jews.

This line of reasoning can be seen plainly in the
Epistle of Barnabas; its author consistently tries to
undermine the legitimacy of Judaism, whilst claiming that the Jewish
scriptures are Christian documents and that they reinforce the
legitimacy of Christianity.

2F –
Summary of Section 2

The historical record of the Catholic Christians
who existed at this time is so poor (especially when we consider the
possibility that the epistles of Clement, Ignatius and Polycarp may
be forgeries) that one can sensibly question whether the Catholic
branch of Christianity truly existed at this time. There certainly
were Christians; but, the writings of very few of them have been
preserved, probably because the overwhelming majority of them must
have had views highly incompatible with the views of the later
church. The few documents available which actually might correspond
to this period indicate that the concept of a set of “New
Testament” writings was not widespread or popular; there was not
even a consensus about which gospels were authoritative.
Paradoxically, of the two documents that do definitively recognise
the concept of apostolic writings being scripture, one shows signs of
being fraudulent or heavily edited, and the other is sympathetic to
elements of Gnosticism (which would later be classed as heresy).
This is particularly significant, because the first person to ever
compile a Christian bible (Marcion of Sinope in the early/mid second
century) also held views that were in many ways similar to
Gnosticism; implying that the very concept of Christian scripture may
originate not with “Catholicism” but with proto-Gnostic and/or
proto-Marcionite Christian communities, and migrated into Catholic
communities later.

Section 3 – Early Roman Catholicism: c. 140AD to 312AD

Sometime in the early to mid second century a man
called Marcion of Sinope became very prominent and influential within
the Christian religion. His teachings were very radically different
to modern mainstream Christianity, yet were acceptable to vast
numbers of Christians of that day. He became the head a group of
Christians called the Marcionites; they were one one of the largest
branches of Christianity at that time18.

Modern mainstream Christians (Protestants,
Catholics and the Orthodox) believe that Christianity is a
continuation of the ancient Jewish religion. They believe that the
being which spoke to Moses and the other Jewish prophets is one and
the same as the father of Jesus. The Marcionites on the other hand
(though they believed that the Jewish scriptures were an accurate
record of historical events) did not believe that the being described
as “God” in those accounts was truly the omnipotent supreme being
of the universe. They believed that the God of Judaism was separate
from the father of Jesus (the true omnipotent being). They believed
that the Jews had never seen or heard the father of Jesus; they
believed that no-one had every known the true God until Jesus begun
to reveal him to people.

Marcion was the first person to compile a
Christian “bible” (though the term bible did not exist at the
time). Marcion believed that only that only the writings of Paul
were truly inspired; his bible consisted of one gospel (similar to
Luke but significantly shorter and ten epistles of Paul (some
of which were also significantly shorter than the modern versions).
Marcion rejected Titus, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy and
Hebrews19;
there is almost unanimous agreement among professional scholars that
none of these were written by Paul.

Besides having a radically different bible to the
Christians that came after him, Marcion also had a radically
different interpretation of it. Marcion believed that the teachings
of Jesus and Paul were in opposition to the Jewish scriptures rather
than supportive of them. He used contradictions between the two sets
of scripture to argue his case, using passages like these:

And
Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, "If I be a
man of God, then let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee
and thy fifty".
And there came down fire from heaven, and consumed him and his
fifty.

2 Kings 1:9:10

[Jesus'
disciples] :"Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come
down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elijah did?" But
He turned and rebuked them, and said, "Ye know not what
manner of spirit ye are of ; for the Son of man is not come to
destroy men's lives, but to save them"Luke 9:54:55

And
if a woman have issue, and if her issue in her flesh be blood, she
shall be put apart seven days; whosoever toucheth her shall be
unclean until the even... and if a woman have an issue of her
blood... beyond the time of her separation,...
she shall be unclean.

Leviticus 15:19, 25

And
a woman having an issue of blood twelve years, which had spent all
her living on physicians, neither could be healed of any, came up
behind [Jesus],
and touched the border of His garment: and immediately her issue
of blood ceased.

Luke
8:43,44

Therefore
shalt thou make them turn their back, when thou shalt make ready
thine arrows upon thy strings against the face of them
(Psalm 21:12).Yea,
he sent out his arrows, and scattered them; and he shot out
lightnings, and discomfited them. (Psalm
18:4)
Clouds and darkness are round about him... (97:2a)
He
sent darkness, and made it dark...(Psalm
105a). He
cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and
indignation, and trouble, by sending evil angels among them
(Psalm 78:49).

Wherefore
take unto you the whole armour of God, that you may be able to
withstand the evil one...taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye
shall be able to quench all the fiery arrows of the wicked
(Ephesians 6:16). For
we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against
principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness
of this Aeon, against spiritual wickedness in high places(Ephesians 6:12)

Obviously
the modern Gospel of
Luke and epistles of
Paul contain many passages that contradict Marcion's teaching;
however, many such passages were not present in the Marcionite
version the documents. The majority of Christian scholars believe
that this is because Marcion removed passages that contradicted his
views; however, there is evidence that
in fact the Catholics added these passages to their version of
the epistles21.

I have chosen to use this event as transition
point between sections 2 and 3 of this article because of the
profound effect this had on Christianity as a whole. The surviving
Christian writings prior to Marcion are few and far between and we
can determine little of the history of Catholicism from them. There
is no evidence of any consensus among them regarding the concept of
Christian scripture. After Marcion's time we find numerous long and
well preserved texts written by Christians who identified as
“Catholic”,
and mostly agreed that the writings of the apostles were scripture.

3A –
Justin Martyr (c.114-165AD)

The first Christian to leave a substantial body of
writings was Justin Martyr; he lived (c.114-165AD), and is considered
a saint by Catholics, Orthodox Christians, and several Protestant
groups. There are fourteen surviving documents that have
traditionally been attributed to Justin, according to nearly
universal opinion among scholars three of these are genuine and six
are fraudulent; opinion is divided on the remaining five. The three
authentic documents are long and developed treaties that provide a
wealth of information far more substantial than the handful of
epistles written by Christians prior to this time.

The writings of Justin Martyr contain quotations
that appear to have come from gospels, but Justin never refers to
them by their modern names. Instead he refers to them as the
“memoirs
of the apostles” for example:

...when [Jesus] went up from the
river Jordan, at the time when the voice spake to Him, ‘Thou art my
Son: this day have I begotten Thee,’22is recorded in the memoirs of the apostles...

For in the memoirs which I
say were drawn up by His apostles and those who followed them,
[it
is recorded] that His sweat fell down like drops
of blood while He was praying, and saying, ‘If it be possible, let
this cup pass:’

Both quotations are from Dialogue with Trypho,
chapter 103, written in c. 142AD.

Justin Martyr is the second person to mention the
name of one of the books that would later be included in the New
Testament; the book of Revelations is mentioned in Dialogue
with Trypho 81:4.

Justin Martyrs views were very anti-Semitic; in
many ways he laid the foundation of Christian anti-Semitism that
would develop over the following millennia:

For the circumcision according
to the flesh, which is from Abraham, was given for a sign; that you
[Jews]
may be separated from other nations, and from us [Christians];
and that you alone may suffer that which you now justly suffer; and
that your land may be desolate, and your cities burned with fire; and
that strangers may eat your fruit in your presence, and not one of
you may go up to Jerusalem.’ For you are not recognised among the
rest of men by any other mark than your fleshly circumcision. For
none of you, I suppose, will venture to say that God neither did nor
does foresee the events, which are future, nor foreordained his
deserts for each one. Accordingly, these things have happened to you
in fairness and justice, for you have slain the Just One [Jesus],
and His prophets before Him...

Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho,
chapter 14

In Justin Martyr's writings we find a great deal
of the development of the idea of Replacement Theology; this is the
idea that the God of the Jews has abolished his covenant with them,
and that the Christian church is their replacement – the new
Israel, inheriting the promises that were previously made to the Jews
(e.g. Genesis 13:14-15, 17:8). The very first Christian
document to touch upon this idea was the Epistle of Barnabas,
mentioned in Section 2E. Justin Martyr developed this idea
substantially, and the Catholic fathers after him would embrace it
and develop it further. Throughout history this line of reasoning
has been closely linked to extreme anti-Semitism, culminating in the
Nazi holocaust. We will return return to the topic of Replacement
Theology as we encounter it elsewhere in the writings of the Catholic
fathers.

Nor do we think
that there is one God for us [Christians],
another for you [Jews],
but that He alone is God who led your fathers out from Egypt with a
strong hand and a high arm. Nor have we trusted in any other (for
there is no other), but in Him in whom you also have trusted, the God
of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob.… Now, law placed against
law has abrogated that which is before it, and a
covenant which comes after in like manner has put an end to the
previous one; and an eternal and final
law—namely, Christ —has been given to us [Christians],
and the covenant is trustworthy, after which there shall be no law,
no commandment, no ordinance.... the true
spiritual Israel, and descendants of
Judah, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham…, are
we [Christians]
who have been led to God through this crucified Christ...

Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho,
chapter 11

3B –
Irenaeus of Lyons (c. 130-202AD)

Irenaeus was
bishop of Lyons, and is considered a saint by the Catholic church,
Orthodox church and several Protestant groups. He was a very
significant figure in the development of Catholicism; he wrote
several works, but the only one that has survived complete to the
present day is Adversus
Haereses (Against Heresies) which was
probably written between 182 and 188AD. In it Irenaeus indicates
that the church of his time was swamped by the “false teachings”
of Marcion and various Gnostics. The work is divided into five
books; in the first Irenaeus describes the beliefs of these rival
forms of Christianity; in the second he sets out to refute them; in
the remaining three he explains Christian teachings that he considers
“true”. In the process of doing this Irenaeus did a great deal
to define the Catholic perspective of orthodoxy and heresy. He
introduces numerous ideas intended to bolster the authority of
“Catholic” Christianity and de-legitimise all other forms of
Christianity. He argues:

That there has been an unbroken chain of
Catholic bishops and teachers stretching right back to the apostles
themselves, all with compatible and similar beliefs23;
this concept is known as apostolic succession because the bishops
are said to be the successors of the apostles.

That the Catholics preserve scriptures
written by the apostles and their associates24.

That beliefs and practices of Catholic
Christians thus pre-date those of heretics, and so are the original
and legitimate form of Christianity25.

The blessed
apostles, then, having founded and built up the Church, committed
into the hands of Linus the office of the episcopate. Of this Linus,
Paul makes mention in the Epistles to Timothy. To him succeeded
Anacletus; and after him, in the third place from the apostles,
Clement was allotted the bishopric. This man, as he had seen the
blessed apostles, and had been conversant with them, might be said to
have the preaching of the apostles still echoing [in his ears], and
their traditions before his eyes. Nor was he alone [in this], for
there were many still remaining who had received instructions from
the apostles. In the time of this Clement, no small dissension having
occurred among the brethren at Corinth, the Church in Rome despatched
a most powerful letter to the Corinthians [the
(probably fraudulent) epistle 1
Clement,
mentioned in Section 2A],
exhorting them to peace, renewing their faith, and declaring the
tradition which it had lately received from the apostles, proclaiming
the one God, omnipotent, the Maker of heaven and earth,... whosoever
chooses to do so, may learn that He, the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, was preached by the Churches, and may also understand the
apostolical tradition of the Church, since this Epistle is of older
date than these men who are now propagating falsehood,...

Irenaeus in Against Heresies, book 3,
chapter 3, paragraph 3.

There are three problems with Irenaeus' argument.

Firstly, as discussed in Section 2, the historical
record of Catholic Christianity prior to the mid second century is
patchy at best. Even among the writings attributed to Justin Martyr
(the last Catholic father before Irenaeus) the forgeries outnumber
the authentic documents; the situation gets worse the further back we
look. It is particularly interesting that Irenaeus quotes older
“Catholic” documents to support his case, namely 1 Clement
and the epistles of Ignatius and Polycarp; these epistles in
particular show signs of forgery and fraudulent alterations.

Secondly, the few documents that we do have,
contain statements that are radically out of sync with modern
beliefs, and show no agreement at all on what should be considered
Christian scripture26.

Thirdly, those early documents also indicate that
the church then was just as permeated by widespread “heresy” then
as it was in Irenaeus' time, undermining the idea that the “heresies”
are younger than “orthodox” belief – the entire point of
Irenaeus' argument. In spite of these flaws the arguments of
Irenaeus became foundational to the identity of “Catholic” (and
later Orthodox) Christianity. Irenaeus also laid the foundation for
the development of the Christian bible.

Since Irenaeus views are arguments are
particularly significant to the development of Christianity and the
Bible I will look at two aspects of his reasoning in more detail.

Apostolic Scriptures

Irenaeus is the first person (who's writings
survive) to advocate a four gospel canon of scripture. He talks
about the authorship of the four gospels he accepts in Against
Heresies book 3, chapter 1, verse 1:

Matthew also issued a written
Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul
were preaching at Rome, and laying the foundations of the Church.
After their departure, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter,
did also hand down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter.
Luke also, the companion of Paul, recorded in a book the Gospel
preached by him. Afterwards, John, the disciple of the Lord, who also
had leaned upon His breast, did himself publish a Gospel during his
residence at Ephesus in Asia.

Irenaeus argued against the legitimacy of any
other gospels by saying that number of legitimate gospels had to be
four, corresponding to the four zones of the earth and the four
winds27;
a somewhat fuzzy line of reasoning. The majority of Catholic fathers
who came after Irenaeus accepted his conclusion that their had to be
four legitimate gospels; but, to my knowledge they never re-addressed
the matter of why this must be so.

Irenaeus' key point regarding scripture is that
these documents derive their authority from close connection to an
apostle28;
the question of who wrote them is therefore a critical issue. But
how can Irenaeus' (writing in the late second century) know who wrote
the gospels? For Matthew and Mark, Irenaeus is
repeating the statements of
Papias; though adding a tiny bit of extra detail about Mark,
and saying slightly less about Matthew.
We have already seen (in Section 2D) that either Papias was wrong
about Matthew,
or the contents of that gospel have changed since Papias' time.

Irenaeus' argument is severely undermined by the
fact that up until his time there is been no agreement at all among
Christians about which documents should be considered scripture. To
illustrate this, the table below outlines the attitude various early
Christians had towards the apostle Paul:

Documents that do not mention the apostle
Paul even once; their authors probably either rejected him, or
had not heard of him:

Writers who knew of Paul and respected him
as a teacher; they quoted his letters but there is no indication
that they considered them scripture:

Early Christians who respected Paul as a
Christian teacher and considered his writings to be scripture:

The Didache

The epistles of Ignatius (suspected forgeries)

Polycarp's epistle

(suspected forgery)

The Epistle to Diognetus

1 Clement

(suspected forgery)

Marcion of Sinope

(a “heretic”)

The Epistle of Barnabas

(fraudulent but old)

Basilides, Valentinus and numerous other
Gnostic leaders (“heretics”)

The surviving portions of the writings of
Papias

The surviving portions of the writings of
Hegesippus

2 Clement

(fraudulent but old)

The authentic writings of Justin Martyr

Irenaeus' writings were extremely influential.
The majority of Catholic fathers who came after Irenaeus accepted his
idea of a four gospel cannon and even accepted Paul's writings as
scripture (despite the fact that Paul's writings were extremely
popular among Gnostics and Marcionites). Advocates of traditional
Christianity often argue that from this point on there was a good
consensus about which books should be considered scripture; this is
somewhat exaggerated, as we shall see, but it is fair to say that
after the time of Irenaeus the scriptures recognized by Christians
moved a significant step closer to the New Testament that was
eventually chosen.

Irenaeus quotes from many of the books that would
later be included in the New Testament in a way that implies he
regarded them as authoritative; however, he states that he also
regards 1 Clement as authoritative (Adversus Haereses
3:3:3), and he refers to The Shepherd of Hermas as “scripture”
(Adversus Haereses 4:20:2); both of these books would later be
rejected from the New Testament. There is no evidence that Irenaeus
had even heard of Philemon, 2 Peter, 3 John or
Jude.

Apostolic
succession

Irenaeus names a number of early Catholics who
supposedly learned directly from the apostles, in particular: Clement
of Rome (Against Heresies 3:3:3, quoted above),
and also Papias
and his companion Polycarp (see quotations below). Irenaeus also
tells us that he himself was a disciple of Polycarp.

And these things are bone
witness to in writing by Papias, the hearer of John, and a companion
of Polycarp, in his fourth book; for there were five books compiled
by him.

Irenaeus in Against Heresies 5:33:4.

For, while I was yet a boy, I
saw thee in Lower Asia with Polycarp.... For I have a more vivid
recollection of what occurred at that time than of recent events...
so that I can even describe the place where the blessed Polycarp used
to sit and discourse... together with the discourses which he
delivered to the people; also how he would speak of his familiar
intercourse with John, and with the rest of those who had seen
the Lord; and how he would call their words to remembrance.
Whatsoever things he had heard from them respecting the Lord, both
with regard to His miracles and His teaching, Polycarp having thus
received [information] from the eye-witnesses of the Word of life,
would recount them all in harmony with the Scriptures. These things,
through, God’s mercy which was upon me, I then listened to
attentively, and treasured them up not on paper, but in my heart; and
I am continually, by God’s grace, revolving these things accurately
in my mind.

In Section 2D I discussed
Papias; Papias himself stated clearly that his information
came from John “the
Elder”, and that John the Apostle
was already dead in Papias' day. Between Irenaeus' fuzzy childhood
memories and his desperation to build an argument, he has confused
John the Elder with John the Apostle; his claims about Papias and
Polycarp learning directly from apostles also disintegrate; they were
part of the same generation as Papias.

In reality the Christians prior to Irenaeus did
not believe in a succession of bishops, all chosen by their
predecessors stretching back to the apostles. If they did believe in
such a thing, why didn't they ever mention it? The author of the
Didache certainly wasn't familiar with this concept:

choose for yourselves bishops
and deacons

Didache 15

Elsewhere in Adversus Haereses, Irenaeus
gives us yet more evidence that the apostolic succession of teachings
is unreliable. He reveals that his beliefs about the life and
ministry of Jesus were dramatically at odds with the modern gospels;
yet Irenaeus cites transmitted apostolic teachings and the gospels as
his source:

Now, that the
first stage of early life embraces thirty years, and that this
extends onwards to the fortieth year, every one will admit; but from
the fortieth and fiftieth year a man begins to decline towards old
age, which our Lord possessed while He still fulfilled the office of
a Teacher, even as the Gospel and all the elders testify; those who
were conversant in Asia with John, the disciple of the Lord,
[affirming] that John conveyed to them that information.
And he remained among them up to the times of [emperor] Trajan
[98-117AD]. Some of them, moreover, saw not only John, but the other
apostles also, and heard the very same account from them, and bear
testimony as to the [validity of] the statement.

Modern Christians believe that Jesus was 30 years
old at the time of his baptism; Irenaeus also believed this, and says
so in a neighbouring passage. However, the Gospel of John
indicates that Jesus' ministry lasted for only three years31;
this fixes Jesus' age of crucifixion at 33, give or take a year or
so. It is worth noting that this is not just an insignificant detail
of Jesus' life story; in Irenaeus' mind, Jesus had to live to old age
as part of the process of redeeming old men32.

Why then is the apostolic tradition and scripture
cited by Irenaeus so out of sync with the modern Gospel of John?
There are several possibilities:

Perhaps the contents of the gospels has
changed since Irenaeus' time.

Perhaps Irenaeus is wrong yet again about
apostolic succession.

Perhaps he was twisting the facts to
strengthen his argument against the Gnostics; this particular group
had beliefs that hinged upon Jesus being about 31 at the time of the
crucifixion.

The statements of Irenaeus are the only link
between connecting the apostles with two of the four gospels and the
early Catholic church. However, Irenaeus has demonstrated repeatedly
that he is not a reliable source of information.

Conclusions about Irenaeus'

Irenaeus makes great claims about knowing the
lineage of Catholic leaders right back to the apostles, about knowing
the details of all of their teachings, and about knowing who authored
the gospels. Given that Irenaeus entire argument hang on exactly
these points we should be wary of bias in his statements. Another
issue is how Irenaeus (writing in the late second century) could
possibly know such things with the absolute certainty that he claims.
We have seen that his main sources of information were oral
traditions, his memory was poor,
he contradicts more reliable sources of information (the writings of
Papias) and his integrity is questionable. In spite of his
bold claims, he is not a trustworthy source of information. This
means that:-

Our only source of information about the
authorship of Matthew and Mark is a fragment of the
writings of Papias; see
Section 2D.

We know nothing at all about the writers of
the gospels commonly called “Luke” and “John”.

We know nothing about the first Catholic
teachers except, perhaps, their names; surviving fragments of
Papias' works are our only source on this subject too.

In spite of the dramatic flaws in Irenaeus'
arguments, his formula for legitimising Catholicism and
de-legitimising other forms of Christianity became foundational to
Catholic (and Orthodox) identity. His arguments and basic strategy
have been repeated by Catholics, and members of the off-shoots of
Catholicism (the Orthodox and various Protestant churches).

Like Justin Martyr and the author of the Epistle
of Barnabas, Irenaeus believed in Replacement Theology:

they who boast themselves as
being the house of Jacob and the people of Israel, are disinherited
from the grace of God.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3:21:1

3C – Tertullian (c.145 AD to c.220 AD)

Tertullian was the first Catholic known to
conceive of Christian scripture being divided into a “New
Testament” and an “Old Testament”33.
“Testament” and “covenant” are old terms for a contract;
these words (or rather their Greek and Hebrew counterparts) are used
in the bible to describe agreements between God and humans (e.g.
Exodus 19:1-8, Jeremiah 31:31, 2 Corinthians
3:14-1534
etc.), but prior to the time of Tertullian, Christians did not
categorise scripture on this basis.

This change of terminology is more significant
than it may at first appear. Tertullian was reacting against the
teachings of Marcionite Christianity which were still one of the most
widespread forms of Christianity at that time35.
Marcionite Christianity is a form of Christianity that rejects the
Jewish scriptures and is not attached to, or intertwined with,
Judaism in the way that Protestant / Catholic / Orthodox Christianity
is. In the work Adversus Marcionem (Against Marcion),
Tertullian sought to argue that the Jewish Scriptures were from the
same God that sent Jesus; he was in part responding to arguments laid
down by Marcion in the previous century. Marcion had argued that the
teachings of Jesus and Paul were fundamentally incompatible with the
petty and jealous character of the Jewish God. Tertullian could not
deny that the teachings of Jesus and Paul directly contradicted those
of the Jewish prophets; instead, he opposed Marcionite beliefs by
arguing that the incompatibilities arose because these two sets of
scriptures were given at different times and for different purposes36.
Tertullian argued that the Jewish God had first given the law, and
then at the time of Jesus, overturned it. Hence Tertullian's
distinction between the “new” scripture and “old” (outdated
and overruled) scripture.

And indeed I do allow that one
order did run its course in the old dispensation under the Creator,
and that another is on its way in the new under Christ. I do not
deny that there is a difference in the language of their documents,
in their precepts of virtue, and in their teachings of the
law; but yet all this diversity is consistent with one and the
same God, even Him by whom it was arranged and also foretold.

Tertullian in Adversus Marcionem, book 4,
chapter 1, verse 3.

Tertullian is commonly referred to as the “father
of Latin Christianity”, and his ideas were pivotal to the
development of Christianity and the bible; it can be argued that no
Catholic father was more influential until Augustine in the 4th and
5th centuries, and Augustine himself was greatly influenced by
Tertullian. It is therefore rather awkward to note that in his later
days Tertullian openly advocated the views and attitudes of a radical
Christian sect called the Montanists, and came to openly revile the
teaching and attitudes of the more orthodox Christians of his day.
The Catholic church denounced the Montanists as heretics, but
Tertullian's writings were far to important to Catholicism to be cast
aside, and so paradoxically he remains one of the most influential
Christians of all time.

The Catholic church had good reason to reject many
of the teachings of the Montanists; like Ignatius of Antioch,
Tertullian was so zealous for martyrdom that his teachings encourage
deliberately self-destructive behaviour. In De Fuga in
Persecutione (On Running Away From Persecution) Tertullian
addresses the question of whether or not it is permissible for a
Christian to try to avoid persecution by fleeing to another place
(something that the gospels actively encourage – Matthew
10:23).

Rutilius, a saintly martyr,
after having ofttimes fled from persecution from place to place, nay,
having bought security from danger, as he thought, by [bribing
officials with] money, was, notwithstanding the
complete security he had, as he thought, provided for himself, at
last unexpectedly seized, and being brought before the magistrate,
was put to the torture and cruelly mangled,----a punishment [from
God], I believe, for his fleeing,----and
thereafter he was consigned to the flames, and thus paid to the mercy
of God the suffering which he had shunned. What else did the Lord
mean to show us by this example, but that we ought not to flee from
persecution because it avails us nothing if God disapproves?

"Him who will confess Me, I
also will confess before My Father."[Matthew
10:32-33] How will he confess, fleeing? How
flee, confessing? "Of him who shall be ashamed of Me, will I
also be ashamed before My Father."[Mark
8:38, Luke
9:26] If I avoid suffering, I am ashamed to
confess. "Happy they who suffer persecution for My name's
sake."[Matthew
5:11] Unhappy, therefore, they who, by running
away, will not suffer according to the divine command. "He who
shall endure to the end shall be saved."[Matthew
10:22] How then, when you bid me flee, do you
wish me to endure to the end? If views so opposed to each other do
not comport with the divine dignity, they clearly prove that the
command to flee had, at the time it was given, a reason of its own,
which we have pointed out. But it is said, the Lord, providing for
the weakness of some of His people, nevertheless, in His kindness,
suggested also the haven of flight to them. For He was not able even
without flight----a protection so base, and unworthy, and
servile----to preserve in persecution such as He knew to be weak!
Whereas in fact He [God] does not cherish, but ever rejects the
weak, teaching first, not that we are to fly from our
persecutors, but rather that we are not to fear them. "Fear not
them who are able to kill the body, but are unable to do ought
against the soul; but fear Him who can destroy both body and soul
in hell."[Matthew
10:28]

In this way Tertullian goaded his readers to
embrace a horrific fate, using threats torture in this life and the
fire of hell in the next. His reasoning throughout the entire book
is highly disturbing37.
It is worth noting that in spite of these views, Tertullian lived to
an old age; if he had died a martyr then his many admirers would
no-doubt have recorded the event and we would know of it; yet his
name does not feature in any of the lists of martyrs; there is no
recorded account of his death as there is for so many noteworthy
Christians of this period.

Tertullian also hated the Jews, and endorsed
Replacement Theology; just like the Catholic fathers before and after
him. Tertullian said that all Jews were guilty of the death of Jesus
(An Answer to the Jews, 8:18), and that they were “divorced”
from “the
grace of divine favour” (An Answer to the
Jews, 1:8; see also 13:13, 15, 26).

Accordingly, all the
synagogue of Israel did slay Him, saying to Pilate, when he was
desirous to dismiss Him, “His blood be upon us, and upon our
children;” and, “If thou dismiss him, thou art not a friend of
Cæsar;” in order that all things might be fulfilled which had been
written of Him.

Tertullian, An Answer to the Jews, 8:18.

The Jew's at that time had recently suffered
terribly at the hands of the Romans; the Jewish temple was destroyed
in 70AD, and then at the time of emperor Hadrian they were driven
from their land and forbidden from returning to it. Hadrian even
ordered that the Jewish “promised land” be renamed “Palestine”;
naming it after the Jew's ancient enemy the Philistines38
this was a strategy to mock and humiliate the Jews using their
history and beliefs. Tertullian discusses the Jewish suffering
without a trace of compassion anywhere in the book, and says that it
is a punishment from God, because of their rejection of Jesus.

Therefore, since the Jews still
contend that the Christ is not yet come, whom we have in so many ways
approved to be come, let the Jews recognise their own fate,—a fate
which they were constantly foretold as destined to incur after the
advent of the Christ, on account of the impiety with which they
despised and slew Him.

Tertullian, An Answer to the Jews, 13:24.

And because they had committed
these crimes, and had failed to understand that Christ “was to be
found”[Isaiah
4:6-7] in “the time of their visitation,”
[Luke
19:41-44] their land has been made “desert,
and their cities utterly burnt with fire, while strangers devour
their region in their sight: the daughter of Sion is derelict, as a
watch-tower in a vineyard, or as a shed in a cucumber garden,”—ever
since the time, to wit, when “Israel knew not” the Lord, and “the
People understood Him not;” but rather “quite forsook, and
provoked unto indignation, the Holy One of Israel.” [Isaiah
1:7, 8, 4]

Tertullian, An Answer to the Jews 13:26,
see also 13:28

3D –
Other Catholic fathers of this period

Christian apologists often try to claim that there
was a broad consensus about Christian scripture agreement among
Christians of the second century. I do not have time to review the
writings of all of the significant Christians of this era, but
suffice it to say that though most of them agreed on some basic
points like the authenticity of the gospels and epistles of Paul39,
there was still left room for substantial areas of disagreement.
There were Catholic fathers of this period who held in high regard
many books that were later rejected from the canon. For example
Clement of Alexandria (150 to 215AD) regarded the following books as
authoritative: the Gospel of the Hebrews40,
The Traditions of Matthias41,
The Preaching of
Peter42,
1 Clement43,
The Epistle of Barnabas44
and The Shepherd of Hermas45.
The Shepherd of Hermas in particular received widespread
acceptance during this period46,
but was rejected from the bible in later centuries.

There are a few books which were neither accepted
nor debated by the early Church Fathers, there is no evidence for
example that 2 Peter existed at all until 248, when it was
mentioned by Origen, who said that its authenticity was doubted47.
There are some phases in the writings of the Church fathers with a
similar wording to statements in 2 Peter; some claim
that these are allusions to 2 Peter, and use them as evidence
for its existence before the 3rd century. On closer examination
their case is weak; the phrasing is not identical and, given the huge
volume of Christian writings from this period it can be explained by
chance, and the existence of common phrases within the Christian
communities that would have been used by Catholic fathers and forgers
alike. Suggesting that an epistle could be well accepted for several
centuries but not once mentioned by name or quoted explicitly is a
somewhat desperate position.

When advocates of the mainstream
bible search the writings of Christians of this period they are not
able to find a single one who would agree completely with the “New
Testament” that we have today.

There was however a consensus among the catholic
fathers of this period about Replacement Theology, and high levels of
anti-Semitism. I could not possibly embark upon a thorough
discussion of the views of all of the Catholic fathers of this
period, but here is one more quote to illustrate my point.

on account of
their unbelief, and the other insults which they heaped upon Jesus,
the Jews will not only suffer more than others in that judgment which
is believed to impend over the world, but have even already endured
such sufferings. For what nation is an exile from their own
metropolis, and from the place sacred to the worship of their
fathers, save the Jews alone? And these calamities they have
suffered, because they were a most wicked
nation, which, although guilty
of many other sins, yet has been punished so severely for none, as
for those that were committed against our Jesus.

Origen, Against Celsus, book 2, chapter 8.

Section 4 – The Union of Church and State: 312AD to 480AD

By the mid 3rd century Christianity had become
large and widespread throughout the Roman empire. Christians were
still a minority, but by now there were many wealthy and influential
Christians48
and the number of Christians was still increasing. This led the
political powers of the time to feel that Christianity was a growing
threat to the culture and unity of the empire, and hostility towards
Christians increased dramatically towards the end of the 3rd century.
Next Christians experienced the most widespread and severe
persecutions that had occurred so far. In 303, emperor Diocletian
and his co-rulers Maximian, Galerius, and Constantius begun to issue
edicts which forced Christians to sacrifice to pagan idols; the
Christian groups that were unwilling to do this (e.g. the
Marcionites, Catholics, Montanists, etc.) suffered considerably.

4A –
Religion and politics in Roman culture

It may seem strange that the Roman political
powers felt that the unity of the empire was threatened by the growth
of Christianity; however this can be explained by the fact that in
Roman culture, religion and political power were closely intertwined.
One of the titles claimed by the Roman emperor was “Pontifex
Maximus” - head of the ancient Roman religion. The Romans were
very tolerant of the pagan beliefs of the people they conquered; they
believed that there were many gods, and that they all had many names;
this made it very easy to integrate the beliefs of conquered people
into the religion of the empire, and greatly assisted the
assimilation of those people. The fact that Christians (and Jews)
believed in a different God was not an issue for the Romans; however,
the denial of the legitimacy of all other gods was. In the Roman
mind, religion was the glue that held society together. When the
Christians denied the legitimacy of the Roman gods it was mistakenly
taken as denial of the legitimacy of the Roman state and the Roman
emperor – treason!

The teachings of Jesus and the apostles contain a
bold concept that ancient Europe was not ready to receive; their
writings are consistently written from a perceptive that sees
religious loyalty and political loyalty as two separate and unrelated
things49.
The reason for the persecution of Christians in Rome is that this
concept was utterly lost on the Roman political powers and
Christianity was regarded as a growing faction of traitors.

4B –
Constantine: the first Christian emperor

In the year 312AD emperor Constantine defeated a
number of opponents and came to power in the Roman Empire. This was a
dramatic turning point in the history of Christianity because
Constantine was sympathetic to Catholic beliefs. In 313AD he (and
his co-emperor Licinius) issued an edict (the Edict of Milan)
declaring Christianity to be the “most
favoured” religion in the Roman Empire50.
Though the Edict of Milan declared Constantine's favouritism for
Christianity, it did not force people to convert to it, and so it was
a huge step forward for religious tolerance in Roman society. Sadly
it was followed almost immediately by an equally dramatic step back,
when Constantine issued an edict that persecution of “heretical”
Christians was to be resumed. Constantine addressed the despised
“heretics”
directly in an open letter to inform them of their fate:

Victor Constantinus,
Maximus Augustus, to the heretics.

Understand now, by
this present statute, ye Novatians, Valentinians, Marcionites,
Paulians, ye who are called Cataphrygians, and all ye who devise and
support heresies by means of your private assemblies, with what a
tissue of falsehood and vanity, with what destructive and venomous
errors, your doctrines are inseparably interwoven; so that
through you the healthy soul is stricken with disease, and the
living becomes the prey of everlasting death. Ye haters and
enemies of truth and life, in league with destruction! All your
counsels are opposed to the truth, but familiar with deeds of
baseness; full of absurdities and fictions: and by these ye frame
falsehoods, oppress the innocent, and withhold the light from them
that believe. Ever trespassing under the mask of godliness, ye
fill all things with defilement: ye pierce the pure and guileless
conscience with deadly wounds, while ye withdraw, one may almost say,
the very light of day from the eyes of men. But why should I
particularize, when to speak of your criminality as it
deserves demands more time and leisure than I can give? For so
long and unmeasured is the catalogue of your offenses, so hateful and
altogether atrocious are they, that a single day would not suffice to
recount them all....

The edict went on to outline that they were to be
stripped of their property simply for meeting together; worse
penalties were soon to follow. The pagans too suffered persecution
under Constantine52.

Constantine did not officially convert to
Christianity or receive baptism until he was dying in 337AD, but this
did not stop him getting involved in Christian affairs. For
example in 325AD, he initiated the Council of Nicaea to settle
disputes about the divinity of Jesus. Though still unbaptised,
Constantine participated in the discussions as though he was a
bishop53.

The Council of Nicaea established the doctrine of
the trinity. Constantine immediately ordered that the books of Arius
and his followers be burnt on pain of death. (Arias was a bishop who
opposed the doctrine of the trinity; he believed that Jesus was born
an ordinary man and that he became the son of God in an adoptive
sense at his baptism.) It's worth remembering that the version of
Matthew 3:17 quoted by Justin Martyr in the mid second century
was a version that supported Arias' beliefs (see Section 3A above);
presumably any similar copies of Matthew still in circulation
were now being destroyed.

This therefore I
decree, that if any one shall be detected in concealing a book
compiled by Arius, and shall not instantly bring it forward and burn
it, the penalty for this offense shall be death; for immediately
after conviction the criminal shall suffer capital punishment.

Emperor Constantine, in an epistle written
immediately after the council of Nicaea. The epistle is recorded by
Socrates Scholasticus (also known as Socrates of Constantinople) in
Ecclesiastical History, book 1, chapter 9.

4C – The emperors after Constantine

Constantine begun the process of converting the
empire to Christianity, but died in 337, before this was complete.
After his death the throne was inherited by his sons Constantine II,
Constantius II and Constans; they initially ruled together, and then
started fighting. Constantine's son's attempted improve the unity of
the Catholic church by making the Catholic bishops accept the
Arianists back into the fold; this bought the emperors into conflict
with the church and they came to be despised by the Catholics.
Constantine II died in 340AD, Constans died in 350 and Constantius II
died in 361.

After the deaths of Constantine's sons, his nephew
Julian became emperor. Julian was the last pagan emperor. He
attempted to restore paganism to its original place as the main
religion of the empire; he prevented Christians form occupying senior
positions in his administration, but did not persecute Christians
violently. Julian's reign was extremely short, a mere 19 months.

There followed a succession of Christian emperors
who ruled for short periods of time : Jovian (8 months), Valentinian
I (about a year).... The details of their lives are not particularly
relevant to the history of the bible; though, it is worth mentioning
that the persecution of Paganism was scaled up significantly after
the death of Julian. It was at this time, over the course of a
couple of decades that the number of Pagans (and there levels of
wealth and influence) plummeted. Rather than focus on the laws
passed against pagans54
however, I wish to focus on the attitudes and teachings of Catholics
at this time. We will see that they encouraged and approved of the
violence carried out on their behalf; this is far more relevant to
the development of the bible, since these were the very same people
who made the decisions about what should be considered scripture.

4D –
The utter corruption of the 4th century Catholic church

I commented at the beginning of this section that
the Romans before Constantine believed that only members of the state
religion could be considered loyal citizens; when the Catholics
gained political influence they themselves continued to propagate
this basic miss-understanding. Violence and brute force continued to
be used to suppress rival religious groups and force conversions to
the official religion, starting with the “heretics” and then
extending to Pagan's also a little later.

Of-course some will object here, and claim that
the Church was not guilty of the crimes committed in their name by
the political authorities. However the writings of the bishops of
the time reveal that Constantine was a very popular figure55.
The Catholic Church approved of his violent actions56.
Sadly there are many passages in the writings of the Catholics of
this time where we find them encouraging even more violence.

But on you also, Most Holy
Emperors, devolves the imperative necessity to castigate and
punish this evil, and the law of the Supreme Deity enjoins on you
that your severity should be visited in every way on the crime of
idolatry. Hear and store up in your sacred intelligence what is
God's commandment regarding this crime.

In Deuteronomy this law
is written, for it says: “But if thy brother, or thy son, or thy
wife that is in thy bosom or thy friend who is equal to thy own soul,
should ask thee, secretly saying: Let us go and serve other gods, the
gods of the Gentiles; thou shalt not consent to him nor hear him,
neither shall thy eye spare him, and thou shalt not conceal him.
Announcing thou shalt announce about him; thy hand shall be first
upon him to kill him, and afterwards the hands of all the people;
and they shall stone him and he shall die, because he sought
to withdraw thee from thy Lord.” [Deuteronomy
13:6-10] 2. He bids spare neither son nor
brother, and thrusts the avenging sword through the body of a beloved
wife. A friend too He persecutes with lofty severity, and the
whole populace takes up arms to rend the bodies of sacrilegious men.

Even for whole cities, if
they are caught in this crime, destruction is decreed; and that
your providence may more plainly learn this, I shall quote the
sentence of the established law.... [He
then quotes Deuteronomy
13:12-18]

Firmicus Maternus in De Errore Profanarum
Religionum57
(346AD); this quotation is from chapter 29, entitled: “Let
the Emperors Stamp Out Paganism and Be Rewarded by God”

In 408 Augustine of Hippo wrote an epistle to
Vincentius, a Rogatist. (The Rogatists were a non-Catholic
Christian group; they were a small offshoot of the Donatists with
very similar views to that sect.) In this epistle (known as Epistle
93) Augustine discusses the key issues that Catholics and
Donatists disagree on; the issue of persecution and forced conversion
being foremost among these. Throughout the first 12 chapters
Augustine repeatedly endorses the persecution of non-Catholics; he
even praises the effectiveness of those methods for propagating
Catholicism, and explains why he and his fellow Catholics endorse
such cruel tactics when it serves the purpose of their religion. An
English translation of this epistle can be found in Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, volume 1, p382-401. Here are a
couple of quotes from the epistle:

Nay verily; let the kings of
the earth serve Christ by making laws for Him and for His cause.

(from chapter 5 / section 19)

Augustine also indicates that his fellow Catholics
were in agreement with him on the issue of forcing people into the
church:

For originally my opinion was,
that no one should be coerced into the unity of Christ, that we must
act only by words, fight only by arguments, and prevail by force of
reason, lest we should have those whom we knew as avowed heretics
feigning themselves to be Catholics. But this opinion of mine was
overcome not by the words of those who controverted it, but by the
conclusive instances to which they could point.

(from chapter 5 / section 17)

It seems that although the Donatists and Rogatists
objected to the use of violence against non-Catholic Christians, even
they saw nothing wrong with violence against Pagans:

For which of us [Catholics],
yea, which of you [Rogatists
& Donatists], does not speak well of
the laws issued by the emperors against heathen sacrifices?

(from chapter 3 / section 10)

What is perhaps most disturbing of all is that
Augustine seems to have believe that persecution and forced
conversion is an act of love:

Who can love us more
than God does? And yet He not only give us sweet instruction, but
also quickens us by salutary fear, and this unceasingly. Often adding
to the soothing remedies by which He comforts men the sharp medicine
of tribulation, He afflicts with famine even the pious and devout
patriarchs, disquiets a rebellious people by more severe
chastisements, and refuses, though thrice besought, to take away the
thorn in the flesh of the apostle, that He may make His strength
perfect in weakness. Let us by all means love even our enemies,
for this is right, and God commands us so to do, in order that we may
be the children of our Father who is in heaven, “who maketh His sun
to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and
on the unjust.” But as we praise these His gifts, lets us in
like manner ponder His correction of those whom He loves.

From chapter 2 / section 4 of the same epistle.

There are many Catholics of this period who's
writings confirm that the Church encouraged and endorsed the
violence. I have chosen to focus mainly on the writings of Augustine
because he is one of the most influential people in the history of
Christianity. Augustine was a bishop and patriarch, he lived 354 to
430AD; he is also regarded as a saint and is deeply revered to this
day by the Catholic and Orthodox churches, and several branches of
Protestantism. Catholics also consider him a doctor of the church.
Augustine is one of the most influential Christians of all time. His
writings and teachings shaped the beliefs of the Catholic church as
Europe went through a transition from Roman times to Medieval times.

those who have understanding
may perceive that it is rather the Catholic Church which suffers
persecution through the pride and impiety of those carnal men whom it
endeavours to correct by afflictions and terrors of a temporal kind.

(Augustine – quote from chapter 2 / section 6 of
Epistle 93)

Augustine also discusses his views on this subject
in his book De Correctione Donatistarum (The Correction of
the Donatists, written in 416AD), especially chapters 6 and 7; an
English translation of which can be found in Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, volume 4, page 629. See also
Augustine's Sermon 62, On the words of the Gospel, Luke 14:16;
an English translation can be found in Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers, series 1, volume 6, page 447-449.

It was in response to the teachings of Christians
like these that the Christian Roman emperors passed laws that
non-Catholic Christians should be persecuted, forcibly converted and
killed.

4E –
Catholics who opposed violence

The Catholic church was frequently
rent by petty disputes, and so even a few of its most senior
figures found themselves on the receiving end of violence. Although
Constantine made Arianist beliefs illegal, his sons would later
favour Arianism over Trinitarianism – yet another source of
violence and bloodshed within “Catholicism”. The result of all
this is that, though Catholicism wielded great political power and
frequently persecuted other faiths, some Catholic bishops also found
themselves victims of violence. Several Catholic bishops were
banished, and on occasion their congregations were violently
assaulted. It is in these situations, and the aftermath of them,
that such persecuted Catholics occasionally wrote statements against
the use of violence to change peoples beliefs. Such statements are
rare in the writings of the church fathers; the few that I know of
(e.g. Hilary of Poitiers and John Chrysostom) were themselves victims
of persecution58.
Perhaps they were just trying to dissuade their enemies from
persecuting them, or perhaps in their moment of suffering they did
gain some genuine sympathy for the “heretics” who were routinely
persecuted much more severely. At any rate I am not aware of any
Catholic who argued against the use of violence strongly,
consistently or when they themselves were in a position of strength;
even though many of them had the courage to openly oppose the
emperors on doctrinal issues. One of the Catholic fathers sometimes
quoted as objecting to violence is John Chrysostom, and he yet he was
one of the Catholics fathers most inclined towards violence and
hatred.

But since our discourse has now
turned to the subject of blasphemy, I desire to ask one favor of you
all, in return for this my address, and speaking with you; which is,
that you will correct on my behalf the blasphemers of this city. And
should you hear any one in the public thoroughfare, or in the midst
of the forum, blaspheming God; go up to him and rebuke him; and
should it be necessary to inflict blows, spare not to do so. Smite
him on the face; strike his mouth; sanctify thy hand with the blow,
and if any should accuse thee, and drag thee to the place of justice,
follow them thither; and when the judge on the bench calls thee to
account, say boldly that the man blasphemed the King of angels! For
if it be necessary to punish those who blaspheme an earthly king,
much more so those who insult God. It is a common crime, a public
injury; and it is lawful for every one who is willing, to bring
forward an accusation. Let the Jews and Greeks learn, that the
Christians are the saviours of the city; that they are its guardians,
its patrons, and its teachers. Let the dissolute and the perverse
also learn this; that they must fear the servants of God too;
that if at any time they are inclined to utter such a thing, they
may look round every way at each other, and tremble even at their own
shadows, anxious lest perchance a Christian, having heard what they
said, should spring upon them and sharply chastise them.

Part of a homily delivered in c. 387 AD by Saint
John Chrysostom, who would later become the Patriarch of
Constantinople. This quotation is from Concerning the Statues,
first homily, verse 32.

John Chrysostom also wrote a series of homilies
about Judaism; these are a classic exposition of Replacement
Theology59,
and the most shockingly anti-Semitic material I have ever read. He
described Jews as “fit
for killing”60
and described the synagogue as a brothel61;
he accused Jewish parents of eating their children62;
in another place he accuses them of sacrificing their children to
demons63.
His homilies on the Jews were later used as propaganda by the Nazis.

4F –
The compilation of the Catholic bible

This period, in which the church embraced horrific
levels violence, anti-Semitism and hate, is the very same period in
which decisions were made about which books should be included in the
bible.

Eusebius of Caesarea was a bishop and church
historian who lived c. 260 to c. 340AD. He discusses the issue of
which documents are Christian scripture in several places in his
surviving writings. Eusebius not only gives his own opinions on the
matter, but also records the opinions of his 4th century peers.
Eusebius even studied the writings of the Catholic fathers before him
to assess their views and try to judge the age of the documents being
considered for inclusion in the cannon of scripture; something that,
to my knowledge, sets him apart from all other ancient Catholics.
Some of his conclusions are surprisingly64
astute; he realised that none of the early Catholics know of the
existence of 2 Peter, and he concluded that it did not
belong in the bible:

One epistle of Peter, that
called the first, is acknowledged as genuine. And this the ancient
elders used freely in their own writings as an undisputed work. But
we have learned that his extant second Epistle does not belong to
the canon; yet, [more
recently,] as it has appeared profitable to
many, it has been used with the other Scriptures.

Eusebius, in Church History, book 3,
chapter 3, verse 1.

Such are the writings that bear
the name of Peter, only one of which I know to be genuine and
acknowledged by the ancient elders.

Eusebius, in Church History 3:3:4.

He also talks about other writings attributed to
Peter that he rejects:

The so-called Acts of Peter,
however, and the Gospel which bears his name, and the Preaching and
the Apocalypse, as they are called, we know have not been universally
accepted, because no ecclesiastical writer, ancient or modern, has
made use of testimonies drawn from them.

Eusebius, in Church History, book 3,
chapter 3, verse 2.

It might seem like Eusebius is here making an
argument based on whether or not these books have received widespread
acceptance. In a way he is, but remember that in Latin “Catholic”
and “universal” are the same thing. To Eusebius, the opinions of
his “Catholic” peers are the opinions of the whole (or
“universal”) church. The “heretics” may well have still
outnumbered the “universal” church at this point in spite of the
imperial persecution and promotion of Catholicism; But the views of
“heretics” count for nothing to Eusebius; they are not part of
the “Catholic” / “universal” church. So in reality then, he
is rejecting these other books because other Catholics (past and
present) rejected them; they in-turn based their opinions partly on
tradition and partly on whether or not the various books suited their
beliefs. By similar lines of reasoning any group could argue that
their version of the scriptures was authentic, and so we must see
through Eusebius' pretence at balanced scholarship.

He states his biased methodology slightly more
clearly in Church History 3:25:6-7:

…we have felt compelled to
give this catalogue in order that we might be able to know both these
works and those that are cited by the heretics under the name of the
apostles, including, for instance, such books as the Gospels of
Peter, of Thomas, of Matthias, or of any others besides them, and the
Acts of Andrew and John and the other apostles, which no one
belonging to the succession of ecclesiastical [i.e.
Catholic] writers has deemed worthy of
mention in his writings.

7. And further, the character of
the style is at variance with apostolic usage, and both the
thoughts and the purpose of the things that are related in them are
so completely out of accord with true orthodoxy [i.e.
the beliefs of Eusebius and his peers] that
they clearly show themselves to be the fictions of heretics.
Wherefore they are not to be placed even among the rejected [but
non-heretical] writings, but are all of them to
be cast aside as absurd and impious.

Not only do Eusebius' skills as a balanced
historian fall short of the mark; his spiritual discernment was even
more dramatically lacking. Eusebius is the the historian who wrote
much of our surviving information about emperor Constantine,
including the biography Life of Constantine. Through out the
work Eusebius reveals that he is a doting fan of the man who
corrupted and persecuted Christianity; he gleefully celebrated the
emperors violence against “heretics” and pagans.

Already have all mankind united
in celebrating with joyous festivities the completion of the second
and third decennial period of this great emperor’s reign;
already have we ourselves received him as a triumphant conqueror
in the assembly of God’s ministers, and greeted him with the
due meed of praise on the twentieth anniversary of his reign: and
still more recently we have woven, as it were, garlands of words,
wherewith we encircled his sacred head in his own palace on
his thirtieth anniversary.

Eusebius, Life of Constantine, book 1
chapter 1.

Eusebius' discusses the edict against heretics,
and celebrates the zeal with which Constantine persecuted heretics,
in Life of Constantine, book 3, chapters 63 and 66 (the
chapters either side of his record of the edict itself).

Such actions as I have
described may well be reckoned among the emperor’s noblest
achievements, as also the wise arrangements which he made
respecting each particular province.

Eusebius, referring to the military assaults on
Pagan temples ordered by Constantine. The quotation is from Life
of Constantine, book 3, chapter 58.

The first person to endorse a set of New Testament
scripture that closely matches the modern New Testament was Cyril of
Jerusalem (c. 318-386), he was the arch-bishop of Jerusalem, and
later came to be regarded as a saint by the Anglican, Catholic, and
Orthodox Churches; Catholics also regard him as a doctor of the
church. The New Testament cannon proclaimed by Cyril is identical to
the set that was eventually settled upon, except that Cyril excluded
the book of Revelations65.

Cyril's writings show us that he was steeped in
hatred just as much as the other Catholics of his day; in
Catechetical Lectures (the only work of his that has survived)
we find him encouraging his congregations to passionately hate and
abhor “heretics”:

19. But hear
whom they say Christ Jesus to be, that thou
mayest detest them yet more. For they say
that after Wisdom had been cast down, in order that the number of the
thirty might not be incomplete, the nine and
twenty Æons contributed each a little part, and formed the Christ:
and they say that He also is both male and female. Can anything be
more impious than this? Anything more wretched? I
am describing their delusion to thee, in order that thou mayest hate
them the more. Shun, therefore, their
impiety, and do not even give greeting to
a man of this kind, lest thou have
fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness: neither make
curious inquiries, nor be willing to enter into conversation with
them.

20. Hate
all heretics, but especially him who is
rightly named after mania [this
is a play on words; Cyril is referring to Manes, the founder of
Manicheanism], who arose
not long ago in the reign of Probus. For the delusion began full
seventy years ago, and there are men still living who saw him with
their very eyes. But hate him not for this, that he lived a short
time ago; but because of his impious doctrines hate
thou the worker of wickedness, the receptacle of all filth,
who gathered up the mire of every heresy. For aspiring to become
pre-eminent among wicked men, he took the doctrines of all, and
having combined them into one heresy filled with blasphemies and all
iniquity, he makes havoc of the Church, or rather of those outside
the Church, roaming about like a lion and devouring. Heed not their
fair speech, nor their supposed humility: for they
are serpents, a generation of vipers.
Judas too said Hail! Master, even while he was betraying Him. Heed
not their kisses, but beware of their venom.

Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures,
lecture 6, section 19-20. An English translation can be found in
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, volume 7, page 39 .
For other examples of Cyril's hatred see section 33 (p42-43) and
lecture 16, section 10 (p117).

Everyone who hates his brother
is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding
in him.

1 John 3:15

In c. 363-364AD the Synod of Laodicea met
and discussed a number issues, including the issue of defining
Christian scripture. The judgements of the synod were recorded in a
series of canons, the last two (no. 59 and 60) relate to the question
of scripture, and endorse an New Testament identical to that of Cyril
of Jerusalem (rejecting Revelations but otherwise identical to
the modern New Testament):

Canon 59: No psalms
composed by private individuals nor any uncanonical books may be read
in the church, but only the Canonical Books of the Old and New
Testaments.

Canon 60: These are all the books of Old Testament appointed to be
read: 1, Genesis of the world; 2, The Exodus from Egypt; 3,
Leviticus; 4, Numbers; 5, Deuteronomy; 6, Joshua, the son of Nun; 7,
Judges, Ruth; 8, Esther; 9, Of the Kings, First and Second; 10, Of
the Kings, Third and Fourth; 11, Chronicles, First and Second; 12,
Esdras, First and Second; 13, The Book of Psalms; 14, The Proverbs of
Solomon; 15, Ecclesiastes; 16, The Song of Songs; 17, Job; 18, The
Twelve Prophets; 19, Isaiah; 20, Jeremiah, and Baruch, the
Lamentations, and the Epistle; 21, Ezekiel; 22, Daniel.

And
these are the books of the New Testament: Four Gospels, according to
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; The Acts of the Apostles; Seven
Catholic Epistles, to wit, one of James, two of Peter, three of John,
one of Jude; Fourteen Epistles of Paul, one to the Romans, two to the
Corinthians, one to the
Galatians, one to the Ephesians, one to the Philippians, one to the
Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, one to the Hebrews, two
to Timothy, one to Titus, and one to Philemon.

The 60th
canon of the Synod of Laodicea is missing from some of the ancient
manuscripts recording the details of the council, and so it widely
regarded as a fraudulent addition intended to clarify the statements
of the 59th canon. Ultimately however, it makes little difference
whether or not the 60th canon is genuine; I have already presented
evidence that the Catholic church of this period was rotten to the
core, with many of its foremost members unable to distinguish good
from evil even on extreme issues of hate, violence and forced
conversion. If the 60th canon is genuine then it represents nothing
more than the corrupt opinion of corrupt bishops of the 4th century;
if it is fraudulent then it represents the corrupt opinion of a
forger of a slightly later time.

In 367AD
Athanasius, (bishop and patriarch) of Alexander wrote a letter66
in which he listed the books that Christians within his jurisdiction
should consider scripture. His list of New Testament books is
identical to that of Cyril of Jerusalem, except that he included the
book of Revelations.
This, a full three centuries from the time of Christ
(according to traditional dates), is the first known instance of
someone endorsing the New Testament cannon exactly as we now have it;
though, Athanasius' statements do not mark the end of the debate
about the contents of the bible.

Athanasius spiritual attitudes were typical of the
bishops of that time. He endorsed Replacement Theology67;
he considered the Jews to be “the
murderers of our lord”68
and the children of the devil69.
He agreed that the matter of religious belief should be regulated by
imperial laws, for instance he described Atheists and members of the
Sadducee sect as criminals70;
indeed, he considered merely disagreeing with, or criticizing, an
ecumenical council to be “committing
a crime”71.
His contribution to the debate about Paganism consisted of demeaning
and dehumanizing them as “more
irrational than the brutes, and more soul-less than inanimate
things”72.

A council is believed to have been held in Rome in
382 under Pope Damasus I. This is said to have drawn up the
“Damasian List”; a list of books considered scripture. The New
Testament described in this list is identical to the New Testament
that came to be accepted. This list survives as part of the Decretum
Gelasianum (Gelasian Decree); a fraudulent document that
was composed in the 6th century. It is impossible to say for certain
whether the “Damasian List” included by the forger was a real and
unaltered 4th century document, or whether is was composed or altered
in the 6th century by the forger of the document it was attached to.

In North Africa a number of synods were held,
chaired by Augustine of Hippo (yes, this is the same Augustine whom I
quoted extensively in Section 4D – the patriarch who laid the
theological foundation of the inquisition and all medieval church
barbarity). The synods were in Hippo (393), Carthage (397) and
Carthage again (419). At these Augustine persuaded the African
bishops to accept the book of Hebrews; they had been reluctant
to do so, but Augustine achieved his objective. The 419 synod of
Carthage also canonized the book of Revelations; it was
possibly the first synod to do so (given the uncertainty of the
Damasian List); the rulings of the North African synods, though
influential, did not have absolute authority outside of Africa, and
so it is likely that many churches at this time still considered
Revelations to be suspect and certainly the debates on this
subject were not over. Augustine himself on the other hand now
considered the question of the biblical canon to be closed73.

Section 5 – Medieval Times

In medieval times the question of which books
counted as Christian scripture was still not considered fixed or
settled. Debates about the legitimacy of Revelations
continued; in 692AD the Trullan Synod ruled that Revelations
should be considered scripture.

The violence and barbarity of the church during
medieval times is legendary. I see no need to dwell on it, or
present evidence that the medieval church was cruel and stepped in
hatred. Obviously the judgements of the church hierarchy of this
period cannot be trusted.

Even after the Trullan Synod the matter of the New
Testament cannon was not considered settled, and disputes about some
books continued. An epistle called the Epistle to the Laodiceans74
became popular and is included in many Latin Bible manuscripts that
date between the 6th and the 12th century. The epistle was also
included in John Wycliffe’s bible, and was included in all German
bibles up until Martin Luther. It is now widely considered to be a
forgery attempting to replace the lost epistle mentioned in
Colossians 4:16, though some (such as some Quakers) still ask
for it to be re-included in the bible.

The chapter divisions in the bible were developed
and added during the middle ages. This was done in the 13th century
by Stephen Langton75
(a cardinal, and the archbishop of Canterbury). The various books in
the bible had been divided up into sections and paragraphs long
before this, but Stephen Langton composed the system that is now
universally used. The modern system of verse divisions were also
added to the biblical texts during medieval times.

Section 6 – The Protestant Reformation 1517

In 1517 a Catholic monk called Martin Luther set
in motion a German movement reforming the church. His views spread
fast and were accepted by many, resulting in a schism. Almost
immediately a similar movement begun in Switzerland, led by Ulrich
Zwingli. This was the beginnings of the Protestant reformation.
Many modern Protestants see this as a return by the church to its
less corrupt (pre-Constantine) state. Sadly the Protestant reformers
left unchanged the root of the corruption – the violent union of
church and state. The new Protestant churches were soon intertwined
with local political powers just as the Catholics had been before
them.

6A –
The corruption of the Protestant reformers

During the first few years of the movement the
Protestant leaders seem to have been opposed to the use of force to
control or spread Christianity. However as events unfolded all of
the Protestant leaders came to fully endorse the notion that
political powers had a duty to impose “correct” beliefs upon
those who believed differently. Soon Catholics and Anabaptists were
dying for their faith in vast numbers, often dying horribly. The
Catholics of the period also horribly persecuted Protestants and
Anabaptists in areas where Catholicism was still in control. The
following quotes demonstrate that the Protestant religious leaders
were well aware of the situation and unanimously supported the
violence.

Every person is
duty-bound to prevent and suppress blasphemy, each according to his
status. By virtue of this commandment princes and civil authorities
have the power and the duty to abolish unlawful cults and to
establish orthodox teaching and worship. Concerning this point
Leviticus applies: “He that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, let
him be put to death.”

Let him who talks about going
under [i.e.
re-baptism – a reference to Anabaptist practices]
go under [i.e.
drowning].

The authorities later carried this out in the
Limmat (a Swedish river) on the 5th January 1527. Manz's only
“crime” was his disagreement with certain Church teachings,
particularly his rejection of infant baptism. Anabaptists rejected
christening and gave a second baptism to anyone who joined their
churches; for this they were frequently drowned, which Protestants
referred to as the “third baptism”.

If he [Servetus
– a Christian with unorthodox views] comes [to
Geneva], I shall never let him go out alive if
my authority has weight.

In Geneva, on the 27th October, 1553, Calvin got
his way. Michael Servetus was tied to a stake and burned slowly to
death, with the last known copy of his book chained to his leg. His
last words before death were “Jesus,
Son of the Eternal God, have mercy on me”.

Again, it is the duty of these
[magistrates], not only to anxiously preserve civil polity, but also
to give true effort that the holy ministry would be preserved, and
that all idolatry and adultery of the worship of God would be removed
from the public square, that the Kingdom of Antichrist would be
destroyed, that the Kingdom of Christ would be truly extended.
Finally, it is of their duty to bring it about that the sacred word
of the Gospel would be preached from everywhere so that everyone, in
turn, can freely worship purely and venerate God according to the
prescription of His word.

Quotation from Article 36 of the Belgic
Confession.

Whoever shall maintain that
wrong is done to heretics and blasphemers in punishing them makes
himself an accomplice in their crime and guilty as they are. There is
no question here of man's authority; it is God who speaks, and clear
it is what law he will have kept in the church, even to the end of
the world. Wherefore does he demand of us a so extreme severity, if
not to show us that due honor is not paid him, so long as we set not
his service above every human consideration, so that we spare not
kin, nor blood of any, and forget all humanity when the matter
is to combat for His glory.

There are few things that I would like the reader
to take note of. Firstly, though the Protestants of the reformation
were more biblically minded than the Catholics who preceded them,
they were still just as violent and so I can only conclude that like
so many of the Catholic fathers before them they were spiritually
blind. Secondly, the underlying cause of the fall of the Catholic
Church was their willingness to unite themselves with the worldly
political powers; here the reformers were no less guilty than the
bishops of Constantine’s time. Modern Christians are appalled at
the thought of anyone being killed for their beliefs, but as the last
quote demonstrates, some of us were somehow transported back to
Calvin's time, he would want to kill us as “heretics” simply for
this tolerance. In Protestant circles the leaders of the reformation
are still thought of as heroes, but they would despise modern
Protestants. Jesus instructed us to judge false teachers by their
actions; the Protestant reformers fail this test.

6B –
The content of the modern bible is finally fixed

It was at this time that the Catholic church
finally and officially fixed their canon, at the council of Trent
(1545-1563); this was partly in response to the Protestant movement
which had broken away and was using the uncertainty of the canon as a
point of criticism of the Catholic Church.
The canon that they affirmed was the same as that of the
Trullan Synod in the late 7th century, only now the matter was
considered closed. The various Protestant denominations and the
Orthodox Church defined and closed their canons shortly afterwards79,
also adopting the Trullan Synod version of the New Testament.

6C –
Modern Christianity

Though the religious leaders of the reformation
firmly believed that heretics should be executed, some of the civil
authorities became growing reluctant to do so. “Heretical”
groups like the Anabaptists were also firmly opposed to the use of
violence against them, and many in the general public were growing
sick of the pointless violence. In time, church and state were
separated, though this was a product of the Enlightenment period
rather than the Reformation. It is a sad fact of history that the
“divorce proceedings” that separated church from state were
initiated by civil authorities rather than the church in almost all
regions, and many in the hierarchy of the various churches resisted
the cultural shift as best they could.

Secular culture became very tolerant; this shift
in attitudes gradually seeped into the church and up it's hierarchy.
This brings us to the situation of modern Christianity. Within the
various modern branches of Christianity there has been no attempt
(since the Reformation) to review or challenge the church traditions
that have been inherited from our corrupt past. Scripture is still
considered the final and only authority in matters of Protestant
doctrine, and no mainstream church organisation questions the
legitimacy of the books of scripture that they have inherited from
their spiritual forefathers. Figures like Augustine and Cyril are
still regarded as saints by the Anglican Communion, just as they are
in Catholic and Orthodox circles.

Christianity has finally awakened to the point
where the vast majority of us can see and recognise the abhorrent
corruption that has swamped our past. The next step has been taken
by very few; we must question the legitimacy of virtually all of the
teachings handed to us by that past; we must even question the
legitimacy of the bible itself, whilst remembering that figs cannot
be gathered from a thornbush.

Section 7 – Misunderstandings and Counter Arguments

This article has looked at several complex and
interrelated developments of European culture and Christian history.
I have tried to deliver the information in the simplest way I could,
but even so it is inevitable that some people will have found this
article hard to take in and hard to follow. The purpose of this
section is to review a small cross-section of the evidence that has
already been presented, and put it in the context of modern debates
about the authenticity of the bible. I will do this by examining a
few of the arguments commonly put forward in defence of the
conventional bible, and drawing the readers attention to the evidence
in the previous sections that exposes the flaws in those arguments.
This section of this article is divided into subsections each dealing
with different arguments:

The corrupt Catholic church of the middle
ages when to great lengths to control the bible, and prevent the
ordinary people from reading and understanding it. Some people
argue that this proves its authenticity.

Some argue that the fourth century Catholic
church was simply a product the culture of their day and that
nothing more could have been expected of them; thus they argue that
decisions of the fourth century bishops regarding the bible should
be trusted none-the-less.

Some argue that since God can use flawed and
even evil people to achieve his work, this aspect of the history of
the bible is not relevant to its reliability.

Some argue that the Donatists split off from
the Catholics because the Catholic church was becoming corrupt, and
that traces of the Donatist movement survived the persecutions of
medieval times and re-emerged as the Anabaptists, who in turn became
modern Baptist, Mennonite and Amish groups.

Some argue that the corruption of the church
occurred in the fourth century, and that the modern church can be
regarded as a revival of the beliefs of the church fathers of the
2nd and 3rd centuries. This argument hinges on the idea that the
Catholic fathers of the 3rd century were trustworthy and already had
a broad consensus about what should be classed as scripture.

There is one final argument that is also dealt
with in this article. It is the idea that any of the other ancient
branches of Christianity would also have embraced violence just as
the Catholics did, if they had been given the opportunity to do so.
This final argument connects nicely with some of the central concepts
that I wish to address in this article, and is it is dealt with
separately in the Conclusion Section.

7A – The suppression of the bible the medieval church

Though the Catholics church of the fourth and
fifth centuries was highly corrupt, there can be no doubt that the
Catholic church of medieval times was far worse. Since religious
authority was so closely tied to wealth and political influence
throughout the middle ages many people joined the church and perused
promotion through its ranks for the worst possible reasons; hypocrisy
was rife, and many in the church were abusing their position to gain
money and power (for example by telling people that their time in
purgatory would be reduced if they paid their priest money).

It was in this era that new languages evolved
among the ordinary people, and the church forbade translation of the
bible into those languages. Church services and sermons also
continued to be conducted in Latin and were incomprehensible to the
ordinary people. The medieval church authorities were no-doubt
afraid that widespread understanding of the Gospel message would
undermine their legitimacy and so they even their own scriptures were
violently kept out of the hands of the general public.

Some people ague that this suppression of the
bible by the corrupt medieval church is a sign that it is reliable
(and was thus able to expose their corruption). This however, does
not logically follow. The corruption of the medieval Catholic church
certainly exceeded the corruption of the bible, and so it was a
threat to them; however, that does not indicate that the bible is
entirely free of error; only that it is sufficiently pure to expose
the obscene corruption of the medieval Catholic church – which
isn't saying much.

I believe that the traditional bible was a threat
to the medieval Catholics because in spite of the corruption it
contains, it is still a source of spiritual teaching. The medieval
Catholics preserved, but also tightly controlled the bible; meanwhile
they (and the earlier Catholics) actively searched out and destroyed
all copies of the scriptures of the Marcionites, Gnostics and other
“heretics” because some of these were an even purer source of
spiritual teaching, and an even greater threat to the Catholic
church.

7B –
The fourth century Catholics were a product their time

It is certainly very true that the intolerant
attitudes of the fourth century Catholics were a product of the
culture of their times. However, the fundamental role of
Christianity is to promote values and attitudes that are beyond the
thinking of the world and the culture of the day.

The Catholic leaders of the fourth century failed
to do this; even if it their failure to understand was, in this sense
“innocent”, it still disqualifies them from by being considered
admirable Christian teachers. They are unworthy to be considered
saints and doctors of the church; and unworthy to tell us which books
should be considered scripture.

7C – God's use of evil people to achieve his plans

Some people respond to arguments such as the ones
I have presented in this article by pointing to examples in the bible
of God achieving his plans by manipulating people who were in
opposition to his will. The Pharaoh of Egypt is an obvious example;
according to Exodus 9:16 and Romans 9:17 God wished to
demonstrate his power and so he hardened Pharaoh's heart to ensure
that he would oppose his plans and provide a suitable opportunity for
such a demonstration. It is unbiblical however, to extend this line
of reasoning to people who are supposedly bringing Christian
teaching, doctrine and scripture; such an interpretation is in
conflict with verses that teach directly on this subject (e.g. Luke
6:34-45). To take take an obscure passage that is not directly
applicable to the question at hand, and on that basis ignore verses
that do directly address the question at hand is absurd approach to
bible study.

In Exodus, God manipulates Pharaoh and used
him indirectly and against his will to do something. This is very
different from the process where God directly uses a person who
serves willingly.

Jesus warned that false teachers were coming80;
he told us we could identify them by their fruit (Luke
6:34-45); are we then supposed to blindly follow the teachings and
scriptures given to us by such people because, in a different
context, God occasionally uses bad people to achieve his ends? God
may in deed use evil people against their will, but this doesn't make
them trustworthy Christian teachers.

7D – Baptist, Amish and Mennonite Christians
and the Donatists

Some argue that the Donatists split off from the
Catholics because the Catholic church was becoming corrupt, and that
traces of the Donatist movement survived the persecutions of medieval
times and re-emerged as the Anabaptists, who in turn became modern
Baptist, Mennonite and Amish groups.

The quick and easy counterargument to this is
simply to point our that:

The Donatists objected strongly to forced
conversions, which their members were frequently subjected to;
however, the evidence indicates that they did not object to the laws
that punished pagans (see Augustine's Epistle 93 quoted above
in Section 4C).

The Donatists and Catholics split off from
one another in 316AD and both groups immediately denounced one
another as “heretics”; meanwhile in Catholic circles, Cyril of
Jerusalem did not begin to promote his version of the New Testament
canon until about 350AD. It is therefore inconceivable that the
Donatists would have adopted Cyril's version of the New Testament.

Some aspects of Donatist belief (and concepts
from other “heresies”) may indeed have survived in a hidden
subculture during the middle-ages; however, teachings and ideas from
the dominant church (Catholicism) seeped into those communities,
including the modern version of the bible; why else would the
Anabaptists of reformation times have read the same bible as the
Catholics and Protestants?

These simple points summarise a few things nicely,
but somehow they don't quite address the very heart of the issue.
The Donatists were in some ways a continuation of the beliefs of the
pre-Constantine Catholics; these Catholics had already gone off the
true Christian path, as discussed in Section 3 and 7E.

7E –
The third century Catholic “consensus”

Some people argue that Catholic fathers of the
third century were still faithful to the original teachings of Jesus
and the apostles, and that they already had a consensus about which
documents should be included in the Christian bible. The irony of
this argument is that the people who use it do not really believe it
themselves. If they did, they would promptly eject 2 Peter
from their bibles and include the Shepherd of Hermas instead
(see discussion in Section 3D).

It is true that during the third century there was
a widespread agreement among Catholics that some books should be
regarded as scripture. The four gospels and the epistles of Paul all
received widespread acceptance from the end of the second century
onwards. But why should this be taken as evidence for the
authenticity of those books when, the opinions of the 3rd century
Catholics are so casually ignored regarding the divine origin of 2
Peter and the Shepherd of Hermas.

There are also more serious reasons why we should
be wary of basing our bibles on the opinions of the 2nd and 3rd
century Catholics. The quotes in Section 3 that I have taken from
pre-Constantine Catholic writings show that they were already
included toward hatred for those with different beliefs – even
other Christians!

These are
some of the key reasons why the (post Constantine) Catholics of 4th
and 5th centuries embraced violence to readily when given the
opportunity do so, and attempted to eradicate from society all people
who had different beliefs to their own. There are other underlying
causes of the violence, such as elements of traditional Christian
teaching, and this is also something which the pre-Constantine
Catholics shared with the post-Constantine Catholics; this is
discussed in Section 8.

Section 8 – Conclusions

In order to
address the question of whether the other ancient Christian groups
would also have embraced violence we must look hard at the underlying
reasons why the Catholics believed this was God's will. I have
already commented that the pre-Constantine Catholics were
anti-Semitic and abhorred those with different beliefs to their own,
and this was part of the reason. To my knowledge we have no record
of the attitudes or prejudices of other Christian groups; the
writings of their bishops, and their account of history was all
destroyed by Catholic persecution. However, we can look at aspects
of their beliefs, and compare those to the underlying doctrinal
reason that Catholic church fell into corruption as it did.

I think it
is fairly obvious that the writings of the “New Testament” (to
use Tertullian's terminology) do not encourage or endorse the violent
suppression of other faiths in any way. Indeed, the “New
Testament” does not provide any guidelines at all for laws or
political structures that a “Christian nation” should have. I
place the very term “Christian nation” in quotes in view of this
fact; the very concept is unbiblical and in my opinion unChristian81.
Instead the model for the ideal society outlined in the very oldest
Christian texts is one in which politics and religion are separate82.
The Christian message is consistently addressed to individual
believers and potential believers, not nations.

The “Old
Testament”83
on the other hand, has drasticly different teaching on this subject.
The books of Moses lay the foundation of the Jewish religion
and it outlines society in which the religion and the state are
unified. Members of other religions were regarded as enemies of the
state, and those who question the faith were regarded as traitors.
In bronze age Judaism religious beliefs and practices are dictated by
laws and violence; apostasy was punishable by death (Deuteronomy
13:13-19, 17:2-7, Numbers 25:4-9). God's vengeance is carried
out by human solderers, at the command of a prophet (Numbers
31:3). Indeed the very basis of the Jewish nation was covenant made
between a God and the tribe.

The Catholics of the 4th century were Judaic
Christians; this means that (like modern Catholic, Protestant and
Orthodox Christians) they regarded Christianity as a continuation and
a fulfilment of the Jewish religion. I have mentioned Replacement
Theology several times in this article, and have explained that the
(pre and post) Constantine Catholics all believed that their church
was a replacement of the Jewish nation (ie Israel). They believed
they were heirs of the promises God made to Abraham and the Jewish
patriarchs, and heirs of the Jewish Covenant (i.e. “New Covenant”
transferred to them and replaced the “Old Covenant” of the Jews).
This is why, when they gained political power and influence, and the
“New Testament” failed to provide them with any guidelines on how
to structure a “Christian nation”, they immediately turned to the
“Old Testament” and its political blueprint for society to suit
their needs. The laws by which pagans
were executed were all perfectly biblical when considered from this
perspective (Deuteronomy
17:3-5, 2 Chronicles
15:13) and the laws against “heretics” can be regarded as an
adaptation of the same principles. As Imperial laws came to
be based upon religious doctrine and the law of Judaism adultery and
homosexuality also came to be regarded as capital crimes; the
executions were often horrific.

The doctrinal foundation of Catholic Christianity
(and its offshoots the Protestant and Orthodox Churches) is a
hybridisation of the (edited) teachings of Jesus and the apostles
(the “New Testament”) with a literalistic form of Judaism (the
“Old Testament”). This is why it was inevitable that the
Catholic church would embrace violence when given the opportunity to
do so.

In the ancient world there was another, radically
different version of Christian theology. The Marcionites and
Gnostics believed that Christianity was distinctly separate from
Judaism. They believed that Jesus came to earth in the midst of a
Jewish culture, but that he preached a message that was at odds with
that culture. They believed that the Jewish God was a real being,
but separate from the true God, who sent Jesus. They believed that
the Jewish God was the “god
of this world” (to use the terminology of 2
Corinthians 4:4).

According to traditional Christian theology Jesus
died to pay a ransom for our sins; the ransoming being paid to his
father. According to Marcionite theology the ransom was owed to God
of the world. According to traditional Christian theology Jesus is
the Jewish messiah, and the Jewish religion is guilty of rejecting
it's own messiah. According to Marcionite teachings the Jewish
messiah is a separate person, who has yet to come and is irrelevant
for Christians. According to traditional theology the Jewish law is
Christian scripture; according to Marcionite theology, the Jewish law
is simply irrelevant and always has been.

In theory the doctrinal basis of modern
Christianity is still the same as the doctrinal basis of 4th Century
Catholicism. In practice however, many modern Christians have
adopted some of the attitudes of Marcionism. The violent and cruel
attitudes and values of the “Old Testament” are increasingly
ignored by modern Christians and seen as irrelevant, or
interpretation of the Torah is greatly distorted as Christians impose
an ultra loving (Marcionite) interpretation on the God of Judaism.
This is obviously a great spiritual improvement for Christians, and
it opens peoples eyes to the corruption of our history; however, it
introduces a great inconsistency into the Christian faith. Since so
many Christians have spiritually changed direction, why should we
continue to revere as saints the “church fathers” who held our
predecessors in the dark? If we want to continue moving in our new
spiritual direction we must cast out the legacy of corrupt teaching
that remains and establish a pure faith, instead of a hybrid of sound
and unsound teaching.

If we now wish to restore the original teachings
and beliefs of Christianity we should look back at the different
(non-”Catholic”) branches of Christianity that existed in the
ancient world, and their scriptures. We must reopen questions that
have been considered closed for centuries.

Thank you for taking
the time to read this article. If you have any questions or comments
please do not hesitate to contact me:

As the brethren desired me to write epistles, I wrote. And these
epistles the apostles of the devil have filled with tares, cutting
out some things and adding others. For them a woe is reserved. It
is, therefore, not to be wondered at if some have attempted to
adulterate the Lord’s writings also, since they have formed designs
even against writings which are of less account.

2The
oldest recorded examples of the word “Catholic” being used as an
identity can be found in Ignatius' Epistle to the Smyrnæans,
chapter 8, the Martyrdom of Polycarp and the Muratorian
Fragment, and the writings of Justin Martyr, all of which date
to the second century. The actual doctrines that are today seen as
characteristic of Catholicism (e.g. the trinity and the primacy of
the bishop of Rome) developed gradually over the centuries following
this.

The word “Catholic” is actually
Latin for “universal”. Choosing this name for their identity
served two purposes for the early “Catholic Christians”.
Firstly, it semantically implies that “Catholic” church is the
whole of the true church. Secondly, it semantically implies that
“Catholic Christianity” is found everywhere; in contrast to the
“heresies” that have separated themselves from the “Catholic”
unity (i.e. been excommunicated) and which are confined to a local
region. The irony of this last part is that part is that both now
and in the early days of Christianity, “Catholicism” is dominant
in only a minority of regions, and the only thing that is/was truly
universal is the doctrinal diversity that the early Catholics so
despised.

4A
classic example of this can be found in the booklet How the New
Testament Came Together, by Peter Head (ISBN 978-1-85174-714-6,
2009). On pages 5-8 he uses references to the bible (especially the
gospels) to flesh out a picture of apostolic authority in the early
church. Then, on page 9 he cites 2 Peter 3:16 as “Our
earliest evidence for a collection of Paul's letters”.
These lines of reasoning unravel rather dramatically when we realise
(as I shall explain in Section 3 of this article) that:

The concept of apostolic
authority was originally developed by the Catholic father Irenaeus
in the second century; coincidentally, Irenaeus was also the first
Catholic father that knew the four gospels by name (see Section
3B), he was pivotal to the establishment of the four gospel canon.

There is no evidence that 2
Peter existed prior to the third century (see Section 3D). If
this were our oldest reference to the epistles of Paul then
Christianity would be in a sorry state indeed.

6It
is clear that the statements of Jesus were of great significance to
the writer(s) of 1 Clement:

Moreover, ye
[Corinthians]
were all distinguished by humility, and were in no respect
puffed up with pride, but yielded obedience rather than extorted it,
and were more willing to give than to receive. Content with the
provision which God had made for you, and carefully attending to
His words, ye were inwardly filled with His doctrine, and His
sufferings were before your eyes.–
from chapter 2

Regarding Paul's writings, the author
of 1 Clement says that Paul the epistle to the Corinthians
under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (1 Clement chapter
47); though, this should not taken as an indication that Paul's
writing were considered scripture; the statements of ordinary
Christians can also be described as from the Holy Spirit (Mark
13:11, see also Matthew 10:19, 1 Corinthians 14:22-33,
etc).

7For
an example of the Hebrew bible being referred to as “scripture”
by the author of 1 Clement see the quotation of Habakkuk
2:3 and Malachi 53:1 at the end of 1 Clement chapter
23; this is just one of numerous instances.

11I
describe this scenario as “tenuous” because, if the authorities
in Antioch wanted to dispose of a Christian they found troublesome,
they would hardly need to send him all the way to Rome to make it
so. Similarly if the inhabitants of Rome wanted a Christian to kill
in the arena they would hardly go to the trouble of ordering one
from Antioch. Remember that Roman culture was renowned for the
simple and practical way that they dealt with problems. The setting
is very convenient, however, for a forger – having a saintly
martyr denounce disagreeable aspects of the beliefs of several
Christian communities whilst on the very journey that will take him
to his glorious death – thus the setting is used to great effect
throughout the epistles.

12See
for example Ignatius' Epistle to the Trallians, chapters 6,
7, and 11.

13The
Jewish scriptures are referred to in this manner in Ignatius'
Epistle to the Ephesians, chapter 5 and Epistle to the
Magnesians, chapter 12. The Epistle to the Philadelphians,
chapter 8, also explicitly refers to the Jewish bible as scripture.

15Irenaeus
is a Catholic father or a later period – see Section 3B. He
claimed that Papias was taught by the apostle John in Adversus
Haereses 5:33:4.

16This
fragment comes from the introduction of his work Exposition of
the Sayings of the Lord, this fragment survives because it was
quoted by Eusebius in Historia Ecclesiastica 3:39. The
English translation quoted comes from fragment 1 in Anti-Nicene
Fathers, volume 1, page 153.

17Both
of these quotations were also preserved by Eusebius in Historia
Ecclesiastica 3:39. The English translation quoted comes from
fragment 6 in Anti-Nicene Fathers, volume 1, page 155.

18It
is impossible to estimate the numbers of followers of any Christian
group from this period, as we do not have enough information. We
cannot know which group was the largest, but there are telling hints
that the Marcionites were one of the largest branches of ancient
Christianity. For example, when Celsus (a second century Greek
philosopher) wrote a book arguing against Christianity, his
perception of the Christian faith was shaped greatly by Marcionite
beliefs (See Origen, Contra Celsum 2:6, 5:54, 6:57, and
7:25-6). For more evidence that the Marcionites were prominent at
this time see Tertullian's statements in Adversus Marcionem
4:4. Additionally the size and influence of Marcionite Christianity
can be estimated from the extent to which Catholics reacted to it;
numerous Catholic fathers (e.g. Irenaeus, Origen and Epiphanius)
devoted considerable time and energy to combating the Marcionite
heresy. Tertullian himself devoted an entire five book treatise to
this subject, and even that was re-written several times (Adversus
Marcionem 1:1:1-2).

19Alternatively,
perhaps he simply hadn't heard of these documents. If the epistles
of Clement of Rome, Ignatius and Polycarp are fraudulent and
incorrectly dated then there is no indication that 1 Timothy,
2 Timothy, Titus or Hebrews existed in
Marcion's time, and Marcion himself is the first witness to the
other epistles of Paul.

21Though
the majority of scholars (particularly Christian scholars) believe
that Marcion removed material from his scriptures, there are also
many scholars and historians that have studied this field and
concluded that the Marcionite version of the gospel and epistles of
Paul are closer to the originals than the Catholic version of the
same documents. See for example:-

22This
is widely regarded as quotation of Matthew 3:17, though
notice the profound difference between the modern text and Justin
Martyr's version of this passage. Modern English translations of
Matthew are based mainly on manuscripts that date 3rd
and 4th centuries; whist this quotation preserves the
form that the passage took in approximately 142AD. See also Psalms
2:7, which supposedly contains a prophecy of the words of God in
Matthew 3:17.

23Adversus
Haereses, book 3, chapter 3, paragraph 3. Irenaeus also argues
that there has been a chain of “heretics” each taking ideas from
one another and adapting them; this chain is said to stretch back to
Simon Magus, the magician mentioned in Acts.

28This
is in contrast the the views of Gnostics, who believed that any
spiritually mature Christian could receive inspiration from God and
write scripture.

29This
is a lost document, but this extract comes from a quotation of it
that was preserved by Eusebius in Historia Ecclesiastica
5:20. In particular notice that Irenaeus' information about these
relationships comes from memory and oral tradition, not a written
source. Irenaeus makes similar statements about learning from
Polycarp who, in turn, supposedly learned from the Apostle John in
Adversus Haereses 2:22:5 and 3:3:4.

But, besides this, those
very Jews who then disputed with the Lord Jesus Christ have most
clearly indicated the same thing. For when the Lord said to them,
“Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it, and
was glad,” they answered Him, “Thou art not yet fifty years old,
and hast Thou seen Abraham?” [John
8:56-57] Now, such language is
fittingly applied to one who has already passed the age of forty,
without having as yet reached his fiftieth year, yet is not far from
this latter period. But to one who is only thirty years old it would
unquestionably be said, “Thou art not yet forty years old.” ...

31One
of the themes of the Gospel of John is a careful record of
the chronology of Jesus' ministry by mentioning the various Jewish
feasts and religious days as they occur. First passover: John
2:13; an unnamed festival: John 5:1; second passover: John
6:4; Feast of Tabernacles: John 7:2; feast of dedication:
John 10:22, final-passover: John 11:55, 13:1. The
three year time scale also has symbolic significance; it corresponds
to the cycle of scripture readings in a Jewish synagogue.

32Being
a Master, therefore, He also possessed the age of a Master, not
despising or evading any condition of humanity, nor setting aside in
Himself that law which He had appointed for the human race, but
sanctifying every age, by that period corresponding to it which
belonged to Himself. For He came to save all through means of
Himself—all, I say, who through Him are born again to God—infants,
and children, and boys, and youths, and old men. He therefore
passed through every age, becoming an infant for infants, thus
sanctifying infants; a child for children, thus sanctifying those
who are of this age, being at the same time made to them an example
of piety, righteousness, and submission; a youth for youths,
becoming an example to youths, and thus sanctifying them for the
Lord. So likewise He was an old man for old men, that He
might be a perfect Master for all, not merely as respects the
setting forth of the truth, but also as regards age, sanctifying at
the same time the aged also, and becoming an example to them
likewise.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies
2:22:4

33In
Adversus Marcionem book 3, chapter 14, verse 3 Tertullian
described the divine word as being doubly edged
with “duobus
testamentis legis et evangelii”
(“two
testaments, the law and the gospel”).

34Some
may object here and claim that 2
Corinthians 3:14-15
refers to the “Old Testament” with the statement “αχρι
υαρ της σημερον το αυτο καλυμμα επι τῃ
αναυνωσει της παλαιας διαθηκης μενει”
(“for
to this day, the same veil remains over the reading of the Old
Covenant”
– both Greek and English quotations are from the Emphatic
Diaglott) this is however only one possible interpretation; the
passage may just as easily be a specific reference to the words by
which the Sinai Covenant was sealed (Exodus 19:1-8). The
former interpretation is based on an understanding of the phases as
they were used since the time of Tertullian (early 3rd
century), while the later is based only on the pre-Tertullian use of
the words.

35It
is impossible to estimate the numbers of followers of any Christian
group from this period, as we do not have enough information. We
cannot know which group was the largest, but there are telling hints
that the Marcionites were one of the largest branches of ancient
Christianity. For example, when Celsus (a second century Greek
philosopher) wrote a book arguing against Christianity, his
perception of the Christian faith was shaped greatly by Marcionite
beliefs (See Origen, Contra Celsum 2:6, 5:54, 6:57, 7:25-6).
For more evidence that the Marcionites were prominent at this time
see Tertullian's statements in Adversus Marcionem 4:4.
Additionally the size and influence of Marcionite Christianity can
be estimated from the extent to which Catholics reacted to it;
numerous Catholic fathers (e.g. Irenaeus, Origen and Epiphanius)
devoted considerable time and energy to combating the Marcionite
heresy. Tertullian himself devoted an entire five book treatise to
this subject, and even that was written and re-written several times
(Adversus Marcionem 1:1:1-2).

42The
Stromata, 1:29, 2:15, 6:6 and 6:15. Clement of Alexandria
considered The Preaching of Peter to be an authentic work by
that apostle, he must therefore also have classed it as scripture.
The Stromata, book 6, chapter 5: Peter
says in the Preaching:...

44Clement
regarded the Epistle of Barnabas as an authentic writing of
an Apostle, it follows that he considered it to be scripture. The
Stromata, book 2, chapter 6:

Rightly, therefore, the
Apostle Barnabas says, “From the portion I have received I
have done my diligence to send by little and little to you; that
along with your faith you may also have perfect knowledge...
[quoting
Epistle of Barnabas]

Divinely, therefore, the
power which spoke to Hermas by revelation said, “The visions and
revelations are for those who are of double mind, who doubt in their
hearts if these things are or are not.”[quoting
The Shepherd Hermas]

46Some
have speculated that The Shepherd of Hermas was written by
the same Hermas that we find mentioned in Romans 16:14,
though several ancient writers claim that is was written by the
brother of Pope Pius I. It was perhaps written 140-155AD, though
some estimates put it significantly earlier than this. Besides
Clement of Alexandria, it was referred to as
“scripture”
by Irenaeus in 160 AD (Against All Heresies 4:20:2),
Tertullian speaks favourably of it in De Oratione (On
Prayer) chapter 16 – though his opinion later changed when he
became a Montanist; it was also described as
“divinely
inspired”
by Origen in c. 244-6 A.D in his Commentary on Romans
10:31.

47Not
all of Origen’s writings have survived, however this particular
statement was quoted by Eusebius in Historia Ecclesiastica
(Church History) book 6, chapter 25, verse 8:

And Peter, on whom the
Church of Christ is built, ‘against which the gates of hell shall
not prevail,’ has left one acknowledged epistle; perhaps also a
second, but this is doubtful.

48Origen
(185-254AD) records that there were Churches “everywhere”
in Against Celsus, book 1, chapter 43. He also wrote:
“At
the present day, indeed, when, owing to the multitude of Christian
believers, not only rich men, but persons of rank, and delicate and
high-born ladies, receive the teachers of Christianity”
– Against
Celsus 3:9

49There
are numerous relevant verses (subject to interpretation): E.g.
Matthew 22:21 & 26:52-54, 1 John 5:19, and
Revelations 12:1-17 & 13:1-18. Romans 13:4 can be
interpreted as supporting a union of church and state –
incidentally there are signs that this passage is fraudulent. The
most relevant point however is the lack of any statements that
Christians should try to impose upon society around them the rules
and beliefs of Christianity. This is in dramatic opposition to the
Hebrew scriptures (or “Old Testament”) which contains detailed
instruction for the structuring of a religious society in which:
alternative religious practices are banned on pain of death (Numbers
25:4-9); Gods vengeance is carried out by human solderers, at the
command of a prophet (Numbers 31:3). Indeed the very basis
for the Jewish religion was a covenant supposedly made between God
and the Jewish nation.

50The
edict of Milan is recorded in De Mortibus Persecutorum (On
the Deaths of the Persecutors) by Lactantius (c.240–c.320). An
English translation of it, and discussion of these events can be
found on pages 25-26 of A Chronicle of the Last Pagans by
Professor Pierre Chuvin (ISBN 0-674- 12970-9).

51Eusebius
of Caesarea (263-339) (also known as Eusebius Pamphilius) was a
bishop and church historian of the time. He recorded Constantine's
edict against the “heretics” in Life of Constantine, book
3, chapters 64-65. He also discusses the edict, and celebrates the
zeal with which Constantine persecuted heretics in chapters 63 and
66.

52In
Life of Constantine, book 3, chapter 48, Eusebius records
that Constantine purged Constantinople from
“idolatry
of every kind”.
Assaults on several temples are described in chapters 53 to
56 and 58 of the same book.

53Eusebius
of Caesarea recorded this in Life of Constantine, book 1,
chapter 44:

he
[Constantine] exercised a peculiar care over the church of God: and
whereas, in the several provinces there were some who differed from
each other in judgment, he, like some general bishop constituted by
God, convened synods of his ministers. Nor did he disdain to be
present and sit with them in their assembly, but bore a share in
their deliberations, ministering to
all that pertained to the peace of God. He took his seat, too, in
the midst of them, as an individual among many ...

Eusebius also tells us that
Constantine was responsible for adding the controversial word
“ὁμοούσιος”
(“one
in substance”)
to the Nicene Creed. He wrote about this in a letter to his church
in Caesarea; the letter is recorded by Socrates Scholasticus
in Church History 1:8:

On this faith being
publicly put forth by us, no room for contradiction appeared; but
our most pious Emperor, before any one else, testified that it
comprised most orthodox statements. He confessed, moreover, that
such were his own sentiments; and he advised all present to agree to
it, and to subscribe its articles and to assent to them, with the
insertion of the single word, ‘One in substance’ (ὁμοούσιος),
which, moreover, he interpreted as not in the sense of the
affections of bodies, nor as if the Son subsisted from the Father,
in the way of division, or any severance; for that the immaterial
and intellectual and incorporeal nature could not be the subject of
any corporeal affection, but that it became us to conceive of such
things in a divine and ineffable manner. And such were the
theological remarks of our most wise and most religious Emperor;...

54One
emperor who is worth mentioning is emperor Theodosius who reigned
379 to 395. He passed several laws against non-Catholics. The most
significant of these is recorded in the Codex Theodosianus,
book 16, 1:2; it dictated that all people must convert to
Catholicism or be put to death. Pagans and non-Catholic Christians
had already suffered considerably from imperial laws and Catholic
mobs prior to this ruling, and would continue to exist for sometime
afterwards in spite of the laws against them.

55Bishops
referred to Constantine as the
“Lord’s
angel”
and described his throne as “a
picture of Christ’s kingship”
Eusebius, Life of Constantine, book 3, chapter 15. Eusebius,
Life of Constantine, book 1 chapter 1:

Already have all mankind
united in celebrating with joyous festivities the completion of the
second and third decennial period of this great emperor’s
reign; already have we ourselves received him as a triumphant
conqueror in the assembly of God’s ministers, and greeted
him with the due meed of praise on the twentieth anniversary of
his reign: and still more recently we have woven, as it were,
garlands of words, wherewith we encircled his sacred head in
his own palace on his thirtieth anniversary.

Socrates (the Catholic writer who
recorded the epistle of Constantine) made no critical comment about
this use of violence transform Christian beliefs. In other passages
of the same book he demonstrates that he had a very high opinion of
Constantine; in chapter 9 we find him described as
“our
most religious emperor Constantine”,
Socrates also complements Constantine’s diligence at the
beginning of Chapter 10.

56Eusebius'
discusses the edict against heretics, and celebrates the zeal with
which Constantine persecuted heretics in Life of Constantine,
book 3, chapters 63 and 66.

58Hilary
of Poitiers was exiled in 356AD for his criticism of an Arianist
bishop; John Chrysostom was also exiled, in about 403AD, due to the
actions of a number of his enemies (other Catholic bishops).

59Although
those Jews had been called to the adoption of sons, they fell to
kinship with dogs; we who were dogs received the strength, through
God's grace, to put aside the irrational nature which was ours and
to rise to the honor of sons. How do I prove this? Christ said: "It
is no fair to take the children's bread and to cast it to the dogs"
[Matthew
15:26].
Christ was speaking to the Canaanite woman when He called the Jews
children and the Gentiles dogs. (2) But see how thereafter the order
was changed about: they became dogs, and we became the children.
Paul said of the Jews: "Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil
workers, beware of the mutilation. For we are the circumcision"
[Philippians
3:2-3].
Do you see how those who at first were children became dogs? Do you
wish to find out how we, who at first were dogs, became children?
"But to as many as received him, he gave the power of becoming
sons of God" [John
1:12].

John Chrysostom, AdversusJudaeos, homily 1, part 2, 1-2

60(5)
But what is the source of this hardness? It come from gluttony and
drunkenness. Who say so? Moses himself. "Israel ate and was
filled and the darling grew fat and frisky". When brute animals
feed from a full manger, they grow plump and become more obstinate
and hard to hold in check; they endure neither the yoke, the reins,
nor the hand of the charioteer. Just so the Jewish people were
driven by their drunkenness and plumpness to the ultimate evil; they
kicked about, they failed to accept the yoke of Christ, nor did they
pull the plow of his teaching. Another prophet hinted at this when
he said: "Israel is as obstinate as a stubborn heifer".
And still another called the Jews "an untamed calf".

(6) Although such beasts
are unfit for work, they are fit for killing. And this is what
happened to the Jews: while they were making themselves unfit for
work, they grew fit for slaughter. This is why Christ said: "But
as for these my enemies, who did not want me to be king over them,
bring them here and slay them". You Jews should have fasted
then, when drunkenness was doing those terrible things to you, when
your gluttony was giving birth to your ungodliness-not now. Now your
fasting is untimely and an abomination. Who said so? Isaiah himself
when he called out in a loud voice: "I did not choose this
fast, say the Lord". Why? "You quarrel and squabble when
you fast and strike those subject to you with your fists". But
if you fasting was an abomination when you were striking your fellow
slaves, does it become acceptable now that you have slain your
Master? How could that be right?

John Chrysostom, Adversus Judaeos,
homily 1, part 2, 5-6

61I
said that the synagogue is no better than a theater and I bring
forward a prophet as my witness. Surely the Jews are not more
deserving of belief than their prophets. "You had a harlot's
brow; you became shameless before all". Where a harlot has set
herself up, that place is a brothel. But the synagogue is not only a
brothel and a theater; it also is a den of robbers and a lodging for
wild beasts. Jeremiah said: "Your house has become for me the
den of a hyena". He does not simply say "of wild beast",
but "of a filthy wild beast", and again: "I have
abandoned my house, I have cast off my inheritance". But when
God forsakes a people, what hope of salvation is left? When God
forsakes a place, that place becomes the dwelling of demons.

John Chrysostom, Adversus Judaeos,
homily 1, part 3, 5-6

62(2)
This is the very thing which Daniel was hinting at when he said:
"There came upon us evils such as never occurred under heaven
according to what happened in Israel." What evils were these?
Mothers ate their own children. Moses foretold this, but Jeremiah
shows that it came true. For Moses said: "The refined and
delicate woman, so delicate and refined that she would not venture
to put her foot upon the step, shall put her hand to the unholy
table and eat her own children." But Jeremiah shows that this
came true when he said: "The hands of compassionate women
boiled their own children."

John Chrysostom, Adversus Judaeos,
homily 5, part 6, 2

63(7)
Do you see that demons dwell in their souls and that these
demons are more dangerous than the ones of old? And this is very
reasonable. In the old days the Jews acted impiously toward the
prophets; now they outrage the Master of the prophets. Tell me this.
Do you not shudder to come into the same place with men possessed,
who have so many unclean spirits, who have been reared amid
slaughter and bloodshed? Must you share a greeting with them and
exchange a bare word? Must you not turn away from them since
they are the common disgrace and infection of the whole world?
Have they not come to every form of wickedness? Have not all the
prophets spent themselves making many and long speeches of
accusation against them? What tragedy, what manner of lawlessness
have they not eclipsed by their blood-guiltiness? They sacrificed
their own sons and daughters to demons. They refused to
recognize nature, they forgot the pangs, of birth, they trod
underfoot the rearing of their children, they overturned from their
foundations the laws of kingship, they became more savage than
any wild beast.

John Chrysostom, Adversus Judaeos,
homily 1, part 6, 7

64“Surprising”
because because like most bishops of that time Eusebius was not
renowned for critical thinking or for his skills a critical
historian. He passes on some absurdly unbelievable stories that he
has heard; see for example Historia Ecclesiastica, book 2,
chapter 2.

65Cyril's
statements about Christian scripture are in Catechetical
Lectures, lecture 4, section 37, written in about 350AD. An
English translation can be found in Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers, series 2, volume 7, pages 27-28.

69but
ye, O modern Jews and disciples of Caiaphas, how many fathers can ye
assign to your phrases? Not one of the understanding and wise; for
all abhor you, but the devil alone; none but he is your father in
this apostasy, who both in the beginning sowed you with the seed
of this irreligion, and now persuades you to slander the Ecumenical
Council,...

If we punish thieves
with the yoke, highwaymen with the sword, and heretics with fire,
why do we not rather assault these monsters of perdition, these
cardinals, these popes, and the whole swarm of the Roman Sodom, who
corrupt youth and the Church of God? Why do we not rather assault
them with arms and wash our hands in their blood?

Martin Luther, On the Pope as an
Infallible Teacher, 25 June 1520 His hared hatred of the Jews
and desire to see them killed is expressed in the work On the
Jews and Their Lies, particularly part 11. Martin Luther's views
on the appropriate treatment of heretics changed somewhat over the
course of his ministry, I selected the quote from his commentary on
Genesis because it is one of the documents he wrote towards
the end of his life. For another example see his statements in his
commentary on the 82nd Psalm:
“Heretics
of this sort must not be tolerated, but punished as open
blasphemers...”

Luther goes on to explain that civil
authorities should hand unauthorised preachers over to the hang-man.

78John
Marshall, John Locke, Toleration and Early Enlightenment Culture
(Cambridge Studies in Early Modern British History), Cambridge
University Press, 2006, ISBN 0-521-65114-X p. 325

79For
example the cannon was finalised with the Thirty-Nine Articles
(1563) for the Church of England, the Westminster Confession of
Faith (1647) for British Calvinism and the Synod of Jerusalem (1672)
for the Greek Orthodox Church.

81I'm
thinking in terms of “Christian sacralism” here; for a more
thorough discussion of this topic you may wish to read The
Anatomy of a Hybrid (ISBN 0-8028-1615-0) or The Reformers and
the Stepchildren (ISBN 978-1579789350); both are by Leonard
Verduin.

82There
are numerous relevant verses (subject to interpretation): Matthew
22:21 & 26:52-54, 1 John 5:19, and Revelations
12:1-17 & 13:1-18, though Romans 13:4 can be interpreted
as supporting a union of church and state – part of a passage
which I considerer fraudulent. Though, the most relevant point is
the last of any statements that Christians should try to impose upon
society around them the rules and beliefs of Christianity.

83Once
again I am using Tertullian's terminology; I am of-course referring
to the Jewish scriptures.

84The
writings of Dionysius are among the ancient documents that the
church failed to preserve, but this statement was quoted by Eusebius
of Caesarea in Church History, book 4, chapter 23, section
12.